They secretly placed a young mother’s name on the mayoral ballot, fully expecting her to suffer a crushing, embarrassing defeat.
Instead, their malicious prank spectacularly backfired. The townspeople rallied behind the unsuspecting candidate, and the joke resulted in the election of the very first female mayor in the United States. This is the documented history of Susanna Madora Salter and the election that captured global attention.
A Stunt to Humiliate Women
Born in 1860 in Ohio, Susanna Salter moved to Kansas and eventually settled in the newly incorporated town of Argonia. By 1887, she was a 27-year-old mother married to the town clerk, and she was highly active in the local Woman’s Christian Temperance Union.
At the time, political candidates did not have to be publicly announced before election day. A faction of local men, angry at the political activism of the temperance women, decided to teach them a lesson. Without her knowledge, they drafted Salter as a candidate for mayor on the morning of the April 4th election. Their goal was to secure a massive loss for her, proving that women had no place in government.
The Surprise Election Day
Salter was completely unaware she was even running for office until the polls opened. When she discovered her name on the ballot, she did not withdraw. Instead, she publicly confirmed that she would accept the office if elected. Upon hearing this, the Women’s Christian Temperance Union immediately abandoned their original candidate and voted for Salter en masse.
The local Republican Party chairman then sent a delegation to her home. After verifying she was willing to serve, the Republicans also threw their support behind her. By the end of the day, the men’s prank had failed completely. Salter won the election by a two-thirds majority.
A Highly Publicized Term
Her unexpected victory made Argonia the center of international attention. The election sparked intense debate in newspapers from New York to Sweden and South Africa.
A correspondent for the New York Sun attended one of her first city council meetings to observe the new female mayor. He reported that she ran the meeting with strict decorum and proved herself a skilled parliamentarian who efficiently shut down irrelevant discussions.
Life After Office
For her historic year of service, the city of Argonia paid Salter a total of one dollar. She declined to run for a second term. In 1893, she moved with her family to the Oklahoma Territory, eventually settling in Norman after her husband’s death in 1916.
She raised nine children in total, maintained her interest in politics, but never sought elected office again. She died in 1961 at the age of 101, outliving the men who had tried to humiliate her.