The Dress
Lisa M. Russell

Rebecca Latimer Felton was sworn in as the first female U.S. Senator on November 21, 1922, only twenty-seven months after the19th Amendment, which gave her the right to vote, was passed. Felton, appointed by a politically motivated governor, served only two days in the Senate. However, her political career began 40 years earlier. Mrs. William H. Felton was her husband’s congressional assistant, drafting bills and writing his speeches. She gave speeches for the women’s vote, prison reform and temperance.  Since she often made trips to Atlanta from her Northwest Georgia home, Rebecca felt she needed a new dress. So she made one.[i]

Today, many of Senator Felton’s belongings, including “The Dress,” are housed at Roselawn Museum in her hometown of Cartersville, Georgia.  Roselawn Museum Director Jane Drew says that we may never know the real reason Rebecca Felton made her dress, “But I am so glad she did!” [ii]The actual dress made by Rebecca around the turn of the century is glass-protected. A sign posted above its case best tells the story of the dress:

In desperation of what to wear (still typical of women today) and not having time for a trip to Atlanta, she took her curtains from the window and dyed them black. She then made the dress, added the lace ribbons and fringed tassels, turning it into this lovely creation. It is all handmade, which she wore over a full black taffeta petticoat.

Writers often find inspiration in the of lives family, friends and even strangers to create unforgettable characters. In Gone with the Wind, Margaret Mitchell had Scarlett O’Hara turn green velvet curtains into a dress to impress Rhett Butler. The sign above Felton’s curtain creation concludes:

This dress was the inspiration for one of her best friends, Margaret Mitchell, when writing Gone with the Wind. It has been told that Scarlet O’Hara was patterned after Rebecca Felton.

Mitchell’s characters are her own creations, but the similarities between O’Hara and Felton are undeniable. Mitchell, a young reporter for The Atlanta Journal, would have known Rebecca Felton, since Mitchell was 22 years old when Felton was sworn in as the first female senator. Rebecca was certainly a role model for Mitchell, and possibly a friend.

In her book Scarlett Rules: When Life Gives You Green Velvet Curtains, Make a Green Velvet Dress, Lisa Bertagnoli asks, “What is it about curtains and strong women?”[iii] In More than Petticoats: Remarkable Georgia Women, Sara Hines Martin says that Rebecca was warned to “avoid collisions…. She went for it headlong and full force…[and] ruffled many feathers with her aggressive behavior.”  I can almost hear Mammy warning Scarlett, “It just ain’t right Ms. Scarlett!” as she forced her way into the business world and into the hearts of taken men.

When a young Margaret Mitchell wanted to quit school, her mother dragged her to crumbling plantations and said, “It’s happened before and it will happen again. And when it does happen, everyone loses everything and everyone is equal. They all start again with nothing at all except the cunning of their brain and the strength of their hands.”[iv]

Later, when asked about the theme of Gone with the Wind, Mitchell said, “What makes some people able to come through catastrophes and others, apparently just as able, strong and brave, go under? I only know that survivors used to call that quality ‘gumption.’  So I wrote about the people who had gumption and the people who did not.”  When Rebecca Felton returned to her war-ravaged home in 1865, sick, hungry and poor, she declared, “I will never be poor again!” Sounds like movie dialogue.[v]

Today, Scarlett O’Hara is better known than Rebecca Felton. History somehow overlooked Felton and her significant role in Georgia’s History. A. Louise Staman, award-winning author of Loosening Corsets: The Heroic Life of Georgia’s Feisty Mrs. Felton, First Woman Senator of the United States (Tiger Iron Press, 2006), relates how she met Mrs. Felton:

I was working in the archives of the University of Georgia when I found an old picture of an ancient woman, dressed to the nines, staring straight at me – almost as if to say, ‘I dare you to discover my story.’ All I had was a name, Rebecca Latimer Felton. What I discovered was one of the most remarkable women in American history, and a story so turbulent and filled with drama, it seemed like fiction.[vi]

The story of Rebecca Felton is kept alive by historians and authors who celebrate her incredible memory. Like so many of the influential women in history, her story is seldom told. However, her influence in great works of art is alive and well, and her tale continues to be told by a most unusual medium: her beautiful curtain dress.

Note: Did you know that while other states have elected women senators to congress, there has never been another woman to be elected in Georgia to the US Senate?

Bibliography

Bertagnoli, Lisa. “Scarlett.” In Scarlett Rules: When Life Gives You Green Velvet Curtains, Make a Green Velvet Dress. New York: Villard Books, 2013.

Drew, Jane. Personal interview. Roselawn, Cartersville, GAApril 2008.

Martin, Sara Hines. Georgia’s Remarkable Women: Daughters, Wives, Sisters, and Mothers Who Shaped History. Globe Pequot Press, 2002.

Russell, Lisa M. “Epilogue.” In Lost Towns of North Georgia. The History Press, 2016. Kindle.

Staman, A. Louise. Loosening Corsets: The Heroic Life of Georgia’s Feisty Mrs. Felton, First Woman Senator of the United States. Macon: Tiger Iron Press, 2006.

[i]  Lisa M Russell, “Epilogue,” in Lost Towns of North Georgia (The History Press, 2016).

[ii] Jane Drew, Personal interview, Roselawn, Cartersville, GA, April 2008.

[iii] Lisa Bertagnoli, “Scarlett,” in Scarlett Rules: When Life Gives You Green Velvet Curtains, Make a Green Velvet Dress (New York: Villard Books, 2013), 44.

[iv] Sara Hines Martin, Georgia’s Remarkable Women: Daughters, Wives, Sisters, and Mothers Who Shaped History (Globe Pequot Press, 2002).

[v] Martin, Georgia’s Remarkable Women.

[vi]  A. Louise Staman, Loosening Corsets: The Heroic Life of Georgia’s Feisty Mrs. Felton, First Woman Senator of the United States (Macon: Tiger Iron Press, 2006).