Lace collar

Circular point-lace collar made by Catherine Helen Spence in the year of her death as a wedding present to Alfred Allen Simpson and Janet Doris Hubbe in 1910. The donor was the couple's daughter.

Collar measures 520 mm across at its widest point. Frame dimensions 670 x 670 mm.

Catherine Helen Spence was born on 31 October 1825 in Melrose, Scotland. Her family migrated to South Australia in 1839.

Spence became Australia's first truly professional woman journalist and first female political candidate. She was a dedicated social and political reformer in South Australia. Her  influence on suffrage, culminating in South Australia being the first Australian colony to grant the vote to women, and the first in the world to give women the right to stand for Parliament, extended beyond Australia. In later years she was known as the 'Grand Old Woman of Australia'. She died on 3 April 1910.

The Spence archival materials held at the State Library of South Australia include her 1894 diary, letters, manuscripts of sermons, articles written for publication, lectures, scrapbooks, and newspaper clippings. The text of the novel Handfasted, reminiscences of and by Spence, and literary manuscripts are also held.

Permission to use this item for any purpose, including publishing, is not required from the State Library under these conditions of use.

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