A Time for Courage: The Suffragette Diary of Kathleen Bowen – Washington D.C. 1917 by Kathryn Lasky

Reviewed by Bridget

Ratings

Content Ratings based on a 0-5 scale where
0 = no objectionable content and
5 = an excessive or disturbing level of content

Guide to Rating System

LANGUAGE

VIOLENCE

SEXUAL CONTENT

ADULT THEMES

Ratings Explanation

Violence:  As the women are peacefully picketing in front of the White House, a riot ensues and the suffragettes are attacked by young Army and Navy men.  (The suffragettes are viewed as unpatriotic.)  The soldiers punched and dragged the women.  More than 200 women are arrested on false charges of “obstructing traffic”.  The soldiers nearly pulled Lucy Burns, a suffragette leader off the balcony at The National Women’s Party Headquarters.  A shot was fired at that time into the headquarters, narrowly missing Ella Dean.   The more than 200 women who were arrested were sent to Occcoquan Workhouse in Virginia where they were treated brutally.  The women were beaten and fed food filled with worms.  The suffragettes then began a hunger strike and were force-fed with a tube.  The force-feeding is described in vivid detail.  Alma, Kat’s cousin ran away from home and joined the Red Cross and the Voluntary Aid Detachment in England.  She vividly describes the wounds of the soldiers she attends to as they are brought back from the front for aid.

Adult Themes:  The fight for a woman’s right to vote began when the suffragettes demanded equality under the constitution, instead of the chivalry they had already been granted.  Sojourner Truth’s life as a slave is recounted as well as her speech, “Ain’t I a Woman”.  World War I is the historical backdrop.

Synopsis

Kathleen Bowen, a fictional character, is a 13 year old girl who lives in Washington D.C. in 1917.  She attends Miss Pruitt’s Academy for Young Ladies.  Her father is a renowned doctor and her mother is a society lady and a suffragette.  Kat has two older sisters.  The oldest attends the university and the sister just older than Kat runs away from home to drive an ambulance in France during World War I.  Kat spends a lot of time with her cousin, Alma.  Kat’s mother is heavily involved fighting the cause of women’s rights.  Kat’s mother is incarcerated in the Occoquan Workhouse for several months.  Kat’s father spends a lot of time training people to become medical personnel for the war effort.  Kat leads a lonely existence as her parents are gone tending to their causes.  She says, “It’s not easy being the child of a parent or parents with noble causes.  You want to believe in what your parents believe.  On the other hand  you’re still a kid.  You want your mom there for you.”

I enjoyed reading about the Suffragette Movement from the perspective of the daughter of a suffragette.  This book provides a glimpse of the sacrifices the families of the sufragettes had to make so their mothers and wives could stand in a picket line for months. Included is a timeline of women in U.S. Politics.  I think most young readers would find it shocking that women in the U.S. have had the right to vote for less than a 100 years.

©2009 The Literate Mother