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INFLUENTIAL WOMEN OF EAST KENT 011
A CENTURY OF GROWING
girl Neill Barston
power I
n February 1918, a landmark bill in Parliament, the Representation of the People Act, for the first time gave a limited number of British women the right to vote.
It had been a long campaign fought by activists from the suffragette movement, as well as a broader political recognition that change was much needed.
But that momentous date 100 years ago was not the end of the matter – it only applied to women householders aged 30 or over, which had been bestowed on them for services to the home defence of Britain during the First World War. Women had to wait another decade before the voting system was extended once more to enable them to cast their votes at the age of 21. This proved another staging post towards a shift in attitudes on key equality issues. However, it’s a journey that’s still ongoing today, with latest statistics revealing that as far as the workplace
is concerned there remains a marked pay gap between wages paid to women over men in many sectors doing similar work. This is despite the government’s recent attempts to encourage a greater number of women to advance careers in corporate management and social and political roles.
With 2018 commemorating the centenary of women gaining the vote, we take a look at some of the key female fi gures who have made a difference – past and present – within East Kent
If you wind the clock back a century to the start of the process, perhaps one of the clearest examples of politically enfranchised women in East Kent to make her mark was Canterbury-born Mary Tourtel.
The acclaimed artist had lived
through the horrors of the Great War, and through her skill and access to specialist studies, which was rare in her time for women, went on to fi nd fame as the illustrator of Rupert Bear.
As the youngest child of stained glass artist and stonemason Samuel Caldwell, she found her way into the history books in 1920 with the public’s fi rst glimpse of Rupert, in a single framed illustration titled, The Little Lost Bear. Mary had studied at the Sidney Cooper School of Art and her ability was quickly recognised in becoming a children’s book illustrator, providing artwork for a number of works – including her famous bear. She worked with her husband Herbert, a sub editor at the Express newspaper for a decade, until her eyesight began to fail in the 1930s. Mary is said to have kept a keen watch on the fortunes of her much-loved creation, and died in Canterbury just after the Second World War, in 1948. Her creation lived on in countless
children’s annuals that led to the creation of the Rupert Bear Museum in Canterbury. This was followed by a new TV cartoon series that was syndicated across the world.
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