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Cellpic Sunday – The N.D. Votes for Women League

The N.D. Votes for Women Garden.

Fargo, North Dakota.

In a previous post here I referenced the DeLendrecie Building, one of the most prominent buildings in Fargo’s commercial downtown history. In that post, I mentioned a personal connection to the building in my renting retail space there in an earlier century. The Delendrecie Building was one of the first department stores in the city. It was built in 1894 by Onesine Joassin DeLendrecie, a Canadian immigrant who saw the potential of Fargo as a commercial center.

Today’s Cellpic Sunday focuses on the small garden that was etched out of the sidewalk at the west side of the building. That white sign identifying the garden reads,
“VOTES FOR WOMEN
N.D. VOTES FOR WOMEN LEAGUE
OFFICE ON THIRD FLOOR OF
DELENDRECIE BLDG. 1912-1918.
SUFFRAGISTS WORKED HERE FOR
VOTING RIGHTS FOR WOMEN.”

That sign prompted me to read up on my North Dakota history to find out about the Suffragist movement in our state. The N.D. Votes for Women League was founded in 1912 by Mary Darrow Weible, Helen deLendrecie, and other women who were working to secure the right to vote for women in the state.

The League played a key role in the campaign for women’s suffrage in North Dakota. They organized rallies, held public meetings, and lobbied lawmakers. They also published a newsletter, The Suffragist, to keep members informed about the campaign.

In 1913, the organization helped to pass a bill that gave women the right to vote in municipal elections. This was a major victory, but it was not until 1917 that women in North Dakota were granted full suffrage.

Disbanded in 1920 after the Nineteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution gave women the right to vote nationwide, the guild’s work helped to pave the way for women’s suffrage in North Dakota and across the country.

About the photo: I captured the small garden on the west side of the building with my Samsung S23U. After loading the image into Luminar Neo, I applied my usual tweaks. In the original image, there was a car parked in the diagonal parking space immediately to the right of the garden. I could have erased it with Neo, in fact, I tried, but it was a messy removal. It would take a fair amount of time to clone the small piece of the automobile from the image.

Even though I have had lots of trouble using Adobe’s content-aware removal tool in Photoshop, I have watched several videos on YouTube where the tool is demonstrated and works flawlessly. After undoing the messy erasure in Neo, I sent the image to Photoshop and used Photoshop’s content-aware removal tool to highlight the small front end of the vehicle. The car disappeared perfectly. I then noticed a metal drain for water runoff built into the diagonal part of the curb on the street. Flushed with my success at removing the car, I highlighted the drain and it disappeared instantly. For the first time, I felt real success using Photoshop’s content-aware removal.

I encourage fellow bloggers to create their own Cellpic Sunday posts. I never have a specific topic for this feature, and the only rules are that the photo must be captured with a cell phone, iPad, or another mobile device… If you have an image from a drone or even a dashcam, that’s acceptable as well. The second rule is to link your challenge response to this post or leave a comment here with a link to your post in the comment. Oh, and, you don’t have to post it on a Sunday.

John Steiner

37 comments

  6. Very informative post John 😀. As a woman with feet both in the 20th and the 21st centuries, I feel so indebted to and proud of those brave women who paved the paths for the future generations!
    My entry here:

    Empty

    Reply

    • Thanks, PR. I am afraid we are regressing in some of the progress made in the 20th century. Oops, I slipped up and mentioned something political. I need to ban myself. 🙂

      Reply

      • No, I agree with you. The problem with rational and intellectual people is that they assume everyone will be rational and don’t say enough while the irrational ones make such a hullabaloo about their idiotic thoughts that others start believing in them!

  19. It’s hard to be totally unpolitical. What a great shot and glimpse into such an important time for women world-wide. It’s always great to read about your amazing experiments with processing, too. 🙂 I’ll have mine ready on Wednesday. Meanwhile, have a great week. 🙂

    Reply

  21. Great subject for a photo, I’m glad you took the time to share it with us. Your processing is again faultless. I’ve had mixed experiences with content-aware removal, maybe I should check the videos too!

    Reply

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