Mabel Ping-Hua Lee, Fifth Avenue

description

The first women’s suffrage parade in New York City took place along Fifth Avenue on May 4, 1912. One of the 10,000 marchers at the helm of the parade was Mabel Ping-Hua Lee (born October 7, 1897). At 16 years old, Lee joined other Chinese American women riding on horseback along the march route, from Washington Square Park to 27th Street. Both The New York Tribune and The New York Times wrote articles about her activism prior to and during this landmark event.

In 1912, Lee enrolled at Barnard College, where she joined the Chinese Students’ Association and wrote feminist essays for The Chinese Students’ Monthly. In 1915, she gave a speech at the Women’s Political Union’s Suffrage Shop, in which she encouraged the Chinese American community to uplift the education and civic participation of women. Following her graduation from Barnard, Lee became the first Chinese American woman to receive a PhD in economics, from Columbia University. She published her research in the book “The Economic History of China.” When her father passed away in 1924, Lee assumed his role as the director of the First Chinese Baptist Church of New York City.

Lee was also the founder of the Chinese Christian Center, a community center providing a health clinic, kindergarten, vocational training, and English classes. Though New York women gained the right to vote in 1917, and the 19th Amendment ending all gender-based voting discrimination was ratified in 1920, Chinese American immigrant women and men could not vote until 1943. The Chinese Exclusion Act prohibited Chinese American immigrants from obtaining U.S. citizenship and therefore voting rights. It remains undetermined whether Lee ever became a U.S. citizen and voted here.

More Info:

https://www.nps.gov/places/greenwich-village-historic-district.htm

https://www.nps.gov/people/mabel-lee.htm