Cooking Up History: Cookbooks and the Women’s Suffrage Movement

Cooking Up History showcases a guest chef and our resident food historian, Dr. Ashley Rose Young, preparing a recipe and talking about the history and traditions behind its ingredients, culinary techniques, and enjoyment. In 2020, we will be highlighting objects and stories about women.

Did suffragists care about cooking? As the Smithsonian celebrates the 100th anniversary of women’s right to vote in the United States, the food history team along with guest chef Bonnie Benwick will delve into the role of cookbooks in supporting the Women’s Suffrage Movement. Benwick, who recently retired as the deputy Food editor/recipe editor at the Washington Post, will help us understand the similarities and differences between cooking in the time of the suffragists and today. The cooking demonstration will also illuminate the museum’s exhibition, Creating Icons: How We Remember Woman Suffrage. Smithsonian curator Lisa Kathleen Graddy will join us on stage to share powerful stories of women activists who helped secure the right to vote for women in 1920.

Please join us on the Coulter Plaza after the program for a special Objects Out of Storage event with rarely seen materials from the Women’s Suffrage Movement.

Interested in learning more about this event? Check it out here!