Letter: Journey of 100 years for local Women’s Club

A group of women – many of whom could remember as children, attending the founding ceremony, in 1874, of a new county called San Benito, and, the incorporation of the City of Hollister, in 1868 – sign a newly formed Women’s Club Charter.
Theirs is an agrarian environment with close ties to the founding families in San Francisco and San Jose;
Profoundly active in the Victorian world of 1913, these women proudly embrace the ideals of the Women’s Club movement established in the 1890s through the efforts of Women’s activist, Jane Croly;
In 1913, Hollister’s Carnegie Library is a little over a year old, and already Women’s Club members are voicing the need to establish a County Library;
The Women’s Club of Hollister is contributing to the shaping of San Benito County’s history and is being shaped by world history, the advent of which is World War I, occurring eight months and one week after the founding of the Club;
While World War I is raging on a European front, the women of San Benito County are raging a war against the pandemic Influenza of 1918 – a war which is taking the lives of their families and friends;
These California women have enjoyed the right to vote for nearly two years; there is great pride that the county superintendent’s wife is the first woman to exercise her voting rights in San Benito County;
Prohibition will be enacted within six years;
The Great Depression will occur nine years thereafter;
No one could comprehend a Second World War, Korea, Viet Nam . . .
They do not know they will lose their sons and grandsons to these Wars;
Many Women’s Club members will build homes ordered from the latest Sears Catalogue;
Streets are being laid out, with names looking very much like the Women’s Club Membership rolls;
Today, we glance at those historical Evening Free Lances’ with those tattered, yellowing pages of time and soon realize that being a member of the Women’s Club is becoming a way of life . . .
The Women’s Club is responding to the needs set forth by a global community and in a community situated in Central California, through advocacy, direct service, and education.
During this, our centennial year, join us as we remember women, protect women, challenge women, model greatness and continue to  learn what true greatness means . . .
We recognize that now, as in the early days of our founding, each woman has influenced, and, will continue to influence the historical fabric of our society.
On behalf of the Women’s Club of Hollister, we extend an invitation  to become part of that history.
Cindy Biesemeyer and Joan Sattler, club historians