IRVINGTON — On Saturday, Nov. 7, the Indiana Historical Bureau will be placing a marker commemorating the life of Grace Julian Clarke, a resident of Irvington, at her home at 115 S. Audubon. The ceremony begins at 11:30 a.m. and there will be speakers from the Indiana Historical Bureau, the Irvington Historical Society, and Dr. Anita Morgan from the history department at IUPUI. The event is open to the public, but masks are required and social distancing will be enforced. Please dress for the weather!
Grace Julian Clarke was born in 1865, and was the daughter and granddaughter of noted abolitionists and members of the U.S. Congress George Washington Julian and Joshua Reed Giddings respectively. She grew up in Washington DC where her father was a Representative until 1871. She was exposed to the ideas of social reform at an early age, which continued after the family moved to Irvington in 1873. She attended Butler University’s prep school in Irvington, and continued at Butler, earning a master’s degree in 1885. She remained in Irvington the rest of her life.
Julian formed the Irvington Women’s Club, a literary club, in 1892 and was its president. She was also active in several local and state women’s organizations, including the Legislative Council and the Women’s Franchise League. She was very active in the push for women’s suffrage in Indiana, getting support for it in the state’s women’s clubs. Although the Indiana General Assembly voted down women’s suffrage in 1915, she helped galvanize many groups to serve a common cause. She was involved in the League of Women Voters in Indiana, an organization that remains active and influential today.
After women won the right to vote in 1920, Julian turned her interests to the cause of peace, and became an activist. She was interested in international affairs, and was a member of the national committee of the League to Enforce Peace and a member of the Peace Society. An ardent Democrat, she contributed a column to the Indianapolis Star from 1911 to 1929 representing the Democratic perspective, an providing summaries of women’s club activities. She sat on several boards, and in 1916, Woodrow Wilson appointed her to head the women’s division of the Federal Employment Bureau in Indianapolis. She was appointed to the Indianapolis City Planning Commission in 1931.
She collected and published a book of her father’s speeches, plus a recollection of her life with him, and his biography, George W. Julian, published in 1923.
Julian married Charles B. Clarke, an attorney, in 1887, who went on to serve in the Indiana Senate in 1913 and 1915. She had no children. She died in her home in 1938 and her final resting place is in Crown Hill Cemetery.
