Soroptimist in the 1920s*

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1927-1928 Jeannie G. Todd, Alameda County, Director 1928-1930 Mae Wright Hutchins, San Jose, Director Jeannie G. Todd

The Soroptimist Club membership represented a vital cross-section of community thinking and planning. Service projects, through the years, cannot be recorded without relating the clubs' activities to the influential events of their communities, the nation, and the world.

Clubs that came into being during the "Roaring 20's" experienced the Stock Market Crash and the resultant financial disaster. Service was rendered to club members who experienced financial loss so they could re-establish their businesses as well as meet their immediate family needs. It is true that Soroptimists suffered disaster, however, many clubs initiated Service projects that have paved the way for greater things.

Our first club reported supporting a "Save the Redwood League" project and the establishment of a vocational guidance bureau in cooperation with Oakland YWCA. Today this bureau is a part of the California Employment Service. Sacramento planted a "mile of trees" along the Sacramento-Stockton highway and furnished flowers for hospital rooms. San Jose established scholarships for college students and provided camperships for children. These projects are in existance today in the 1970s.

Different was the project of Watsonville in the 1920s - with its young, "either in body or spirit," membership singing and putting on skits when visiting other Soroptimist groups.

* reprinted from Southwestern Region's history book entitled "Out Where It All Began" written and compiled for a celebration of Soroptimist's 50th anniversary in 1971 and updated and reprinted in 1996 for the celebration of Soroptimist's 75th anniversary, prepared by the Founder Region 75th Anniversary Committee and entitled Founder Region "The Way It Was".