Sorosis


Sorosis of New York City was the first professional women's club in the United States.

History

The club was organized in New York City with 12 members in March 1868, by Jane Cunningham Croly. Among its founding members were Josephine Pollard, a children's author, and Fanny Fern, a popular columnist who had been angered at newspaper women being excluded from the all-male New York Press Club when it had an honorary dinner for the author Charles Dickens the month before. Sorosis was incorporated in January 1869. Alice Cary was the first president. Within one year, Sorosis had 83 members. Along with Boston's New England Woman's Club, Sorosis inspired the formation of women's clubs across the country.
Sorosis is a latinate word meaning 'aggregation'. Its object was to further the educational and social activities of women by bringing representative women of accomplishment in art, literature, science, and kindred pursuits.
Early members of Sorosis were participants in varied professions and political reform movements such as abolitionism, suffrage, prison reform, temperance and peace. Sorosis expanded into local chapters beyond New York City in the early twentieth century and the various chapters went on to organize war relief efforts during both World Wars. Peacetime activities included philanthropy, scholarship funds, and social reforms. In later years, Sorosis focused its activities on local projects, raising money for the aid of other women's clubs, funding scholarships for women, and aiding local rescue missions.
Sorosis was among the 63 clubs that formed the General Federation of Women's Clubs in 1890.
The University of Texas at San Antonio houses a collection of records for the San Antonio chapter of Sorosis. The collection spans the years 1923 through 1991 and provides information about the club's members and activities primarily through minutes, photographs, scrapbooks and yearbooks.

Notable members