“E” is for Evans, Emily Plume (d. 1942)

“E” is for Evans, Emily Plume (d. 1942). A native of Connecticut, Emily married South Carolina governor John Gary Evans and moved to Spartanburg. In 1912 she was one of the founders of Spartanburg’s first suffrage organization, the New Era Club. Evans was also a founding member of the South Carolina Equal Suffrage League. She was also active in efforts to improve working conditions for women and children in the state’s textile mills. She lobbied for more stringent child labor laws and enforcement of the state’s compulsory education laws. In 1916 she became chair of the Committee on Social and Industrial Conditions of the South Carolina Federation of Women’s Clubs. In addition, Emily Plume Evans was a president of Spartanburg’s Florence Crittenden Circle, an organization devoted to “the prevention and correction of wayward girls.”