Re: Emsley
EMSLEY
Posted By: Pat Schultz (email) In Response To: Re: Emsley (Pamela Lewis)
Date: 4/26/2012 at 11:47:47
Oh, yes, I can certainly help you here. I have done a good deal of research on Mary as she and her husband Thomas Emsley founded Mason City's City National Bank. Thomas died (suicide) but Mary remained as active president of the bank until later when she turned that position over to a son-in-law. She was president when they needed a new and larger bank and wanted a hotel and law offices as well. They commissioned Frank Lloyd Wright to design the building, which opened in 1910. She remarried Charles Adams. She died here in 1831. Our newspapers have the articles about her, including the one you mention. I am on the board of Wright on the Park, the non profit organization which has just restored the City National Bank and Park Inn Hotel, the last standing hotel in the world designed by Wright. I got interested in Mary because of her unusual position as bank president and from there went on to investigate other prominent Mason City women including her sister Julia Church Dakin. Both lived into their 90s and were very prominent in Mason City.
I would LOVE to see her diaries. She was very involved in women's suffrage and knew Carrie Chapman Catt and worked with her. She was also a trustee of the state Unitarian organization and a charter and 50 year member of Eastern Star. Fromm all I've read, she and Julia were incredible women. Julia attended Antioch College while Horace Mann was president there and she was supt. of schools in Mason City for two terms - in an era when she couldn't even vote for herself. Wow!!! I'd love to host you here!! Pat
Pat
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