Mary Barr Clay

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Mary Barr Clay (1839-1924) was a leader of the American women’s suffrage movement. She also was known as Mary B. Clay and Mrs. J. Frank Herrick.

A daughter of Cassius Marcellus Clay and his wife Mary Jane Warfield, Clay married John Francis “Frank” Herrick, of Cleveland, Ohio, USA, in 1866. The couple had three sons and then divorced.

In 1878, Clay’s parents also divorced, leaving Mary Jane homeless after she had managed White Hall, the family estate, for 45 years. This inequality galvanized Clay into joining the women’s rights movement. In 1879, she went to St. Louis, Missouri to attend the tenth anniversary of the National Woman Suffrage Association. There she met Susan B. Anthony and arranged for the suffrage leader to speak in Richmond, Kentucky. Clay was elected president of the American Women Suffrage Association in 1883. Clay corresponded with Susan B. Anthony, Lucy Stone, Alice Stone Blackwell and other leading suffragists. She is credited with drawing her more famous sister, Laura Clay, into the women’s rights movement.

Clay is interred at Lexington Cemetery.