Artist Phyllis Garibay-Coon, in white, stands in front of a maintenance worker on a lift following the unveiling of her mural in the Statehouse honoring women who campaign for decades for voting rights, Wednesday, Jan. 29, 2025, in Topeka, Kan. (AP Photo/John Hanna)
TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — Kansas has a new mural in its Statehouse honoring women who campaigned for voting rights for decades before the 1920 ratification of the 19th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution granted those rights across the nation.
Gov. Laura Kelly and other state officials unveiled the “Rebel Women” painting that spans an entire wall on the first floor on Wednesday, the anniversary of Kansas' admission as the 34th U.S. state in 1861.
While Kansas Day is traditionally marked with renditions of the official state song, “Home on the Range,” Wednesday's event also featured the women's voting rights anthem, "Suffrage Song,” to the tune of “The Battle Hymn of the Republic.”
A 2022 law authorized the mural, and artist Phyllis Garibay-Coon, of Manhattan, in northeastern Kansas, won the contest with a depiction of 13 prominent Kansas suffragists. A few women in the crowd of several hundred people were dressed as 19th century campaigners who were active before statehood.
Kansas prides itself as entering the union as an anti-slavery free state, but it also was more progressive than other states in gradually granting women full voting rights. Women could vote in school elections in 1861 and in city elections in 1887, and the nation's first woman mayor, Susanna M. Salter, was elected in Argonia, Kansas, that year. Voters amended the state constitution in 1912 to grant women full voting rights.
Artist Phyllis Garibay-Coon, left, and Kansas Gov. Laura Kelly, right, stand beneath Garibay-Coon's newly unveiled mural honoring Kansas women who campaigned for voting rights, Wednesday, Jan. 29, 2025, at the Statehouse in Topeka, Kan. (AP Photo/John Hanna)
Artist Phyllis Garibay-Coon, of Manhattan, Kansas, touches up her mural honoring Kansas women who campaigned for decades for voting rights, two days before its official unveiling at the Statehouse, Monday, Jan. 27, 2025, in Topeka, Kan. (AP Photo/John Hanna)
Jeanne Klein, left, a retired University of Kansas professor who researched the women's voting rights movement in Kansas, and Louise Ehmke, right, a member of the Kansas Suffragist Memorial Committee, watch a ceremony ahead of the unveiling of a new Statehouse mural honoring suffragists, Wednesday, Jan. 29, 2025, in Topeka, Kan. (AP Photo/John Hanna)
Penny Guy, a retired Topeka, Kansas, middle school teacher who works in the Legislature's documents room at the Statehouse, wears a replica of a 19th Century women's voting rights button as part of a period costume ahead of the unveiling of a mural honoring suffragists, Wednesday, Jan. 29, 2025, in Topeka, Kan. (AP Photo/John Hanna)
Artist Phyllis Garibay-Coon takes a break from her work on touching up and then covering her mural honoring Kansas women who campaigned for voting rights on the day before its official unveiling, Tuesday, Jan. 28, 2025, at the Statehouse in Topeka, Kan. (AP Photo/John Hanna)
Artist Phyllis Garibay-Coon, of Manhattan, Kansas, uses tape to help hold up the fabric covering her "Rebel Women" mural honoring women who campaigned for decades for voting rights on the day before its unveiling, Tuesday, Jan. 28, 2025, at the Statehouse in Topeka, Kan. (AP Photo/John Hanna)
Artist Phyllis Garibay-Coon, of Manhattan, Kansas, used a wide variety of brushes to the Statehouse to touch up her mural honoring Kansas women who campaign for voting rights for decades starting in the 1850s, Tuesday, Jan. 28, 2025, in Topeka, Kan. (AP Photo/John Hanna)
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