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Portrayed by Marjorie Goldman of The American Historical Theater
Susan B. Anthony has been portrayed as a dour Quaker school “marm,” but in reality, this important suffragist had a lively sense of humor and a passion for justice.
After teaching for fifteen years, Ms. Anthony began her 50+ years commitment to causes that included the abolition of slavery, women’s rights to their own property and earnings, and women’s right to vote, demonstrating a will unbroken by circumstance or obstacle. When the suffragist movement was threatened by an ideological split, it was Ms. Anthony who engineered the reunion of the two factions. Near the end of her life, Ms. Anthony hand-selected the women who were to “pick up the mantle,” urging her successors to be ever-vigilant, expanding and protecting the rights for which she had fought for so long and so valiantly. “We turn it over to a generation of women who are better-equipped. They have the unchallenged right to speak in public.” Ms. Anthony did not live to see women’s suffrage, but she knew not to give in, not to give up.
Susan B. Anthony will be performed by Marjorie Goldman.
Marjorie has always loved theater and has sought out training and performance opportunities as early as elementary school. She has participated in Master Classes, among other programs, at the Walnut Street Theater School in Philadelphia and has studied improvisation with practitioners at the highest levels. Marjorie majored in American Studies at Grinnell College, graduating with Honors, and was also certified to teach Social Studies to grades 6 - 12. After teaching history and social studies in Chicago-area high schools, she went on to gain a Master’s degree and to complete doctoral work in American and New England Studies at Boston University.
Marjorie was a Teaching Assistant in both the History and English departments at B. U.and went on to teach at Hunter College, Fordham University, Cabrini College and Philadelphia University. She was pleased to be able to combine her interests in history and theater when she was given the opportunity to portray suffragist Susan B. Anthony (1820-1906). For over 20 years, Marjorie has brought Miss Anthony to audiences throughout the tri-state area and to destinations as far-flung as Lansing, Michigan, Oklahoma City, and Greenville, South Carolina. Marjorie has been certified as a docent at the National Susan B. Anthony Museum and House in Rochester, New York, where she continues to do research as often as possible.
Through her interpretation of Ms. Anthony, we are reminded that “The world is not truly free…until the rights and privileges of others are free.” Therefore, the task is ongoing and “failure is impossible.”
