- April 23, 2024
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by: Kim Medley
Publicity for AAUW
American Association of University Women Flagler nominated Alice Scott Abbott of Bunnell for the Florida Women’s Hall of Fame this year. By August, she was one of 10 finalists recommended by the Florida Commission on the Status of Women. On Nov. 24, Gov. Ron DeSantis announced this year’s selections for the Florida Women’s Hall of Fame, and Alice Scott Abbott, formerly of Bunnell, is one of the three.
She will be inducted to the 2020 Florida Women’s Hall of Fame on Jan. 28, 2021. For the first time in three years, Tallahassee will host the event, and, thanks to COVID-19, a virtual ceremony will be held.
For more than 20 years, Alice Scott Abbott worked to protect wages for women and girls, bring an end to the legal sale of liquor, enforce moral laws, stop trafficking of women and girls, and secure the vote for women. By 1913, she and her husband, George Abbott, left Missouri’s winters, bound for Florida’s sunshine.
Alice Scott Abbot traveled more than 17,000 miles to advance suffrage for women. She died days before she would have been legally allowed to vote for the first time, in 1920.
When she wasn’t crisscrossing Florida for the Women’s Christian Temperance Union and Woman Suffrage, she devoted her time as the music teacher at the First United Methodist Church and the Seventh-day Adventist Church of Bunnell. She organized Flagler County’s first WCTU and proceeded to form a Loyal Temperance Legion for Flagler County’s youth. She even had time to plant strawberries.
Alice Scott Abbott represented Bunnell as a “delegate-at-large” at the 40th-annual Convention of the National Women’s Christian Temperance Union, held in Asbury park, New Jersey. In 1914, Florida’s WCTU President had named her as “superintendent of this district.” According to newspaper accounts, she traveled more than 17,000 miles to advance suffrage for women.
Once the 19th Amendment was ratified, her efforts resulted in voter registration and education for nearly 200 Flagler County women, 52 of whom were African American. She longed to be able to instruct the “blessed women” of Flagler and cast her vote; unfortunately, her health failed. She died days before the Nov. 2, 1920 election.
