Mary Ingraham

For the American social reformer and the founder of the United Service Organizations, see Mary Shotwell Ingraham.

Mary "May" Ingraham (1901 – 26 March 1982) was a Bahamian suffragist and the founding president of the Bahamas Women's Suffrage Movement.^[1]

Mary Ingraham
Bahamas postage stamp, issued October 10, 2012
Born	Mary Naomi Mason (1901-06-30)June 30, 1901 Nassau, Bahamas
Died	March 26, 1982(1982-03-26) (aged 80) Nassau, Bahamas
Nationality	The Bahamas
Occupation	Suffragist
Spouse	Rufus Harcourt Ingraham

Personal life

Mary Ingraham was born in the St. Agnes district of Nassau, Bahamas to Ellis H. Mason and his wife Alice Leanora (née Bartlett) Mason. Three of her brothers became musicians in the United States:

• Norman Mason (1895–1971), a Dixieland clarinetist, multi-instrumentalist, bandleader;
• Oliver Welock Mason, a trumpeter who, in the 1930s and 1940s, performed with the orchestra for traveling ministrel shows; and
• Henry Morris Mason, a trumpeter who recorded as a sideman for Fannie May Goosby, Cleo Gibson, Blanche Calloway, Leon Abbey, Willie Lewis, Eddie Brunner, and Gene Sedric.^[2]

On 30 December 1919, Mary married Rufus Harcourt Ingraham^[1] in Grant's Town, one of the over-the-hill suburbs of Nassau.

Suffragist

Along with Georgianna Symonette, Eugenia Lockhart and Mabel Walker, Ingraham founded the Women's Suffrage Movement (WSM).^[1][3]

In 1962, women gained the right to vote and serve in elected office in the legislature. By 1967, black women had organised themselves into a strong voting block that contributed to the Progressive Liberal Party's general election win and majority rule in the Bahamas.^[1]

Ingraham was also a daughter ruler of the Improved Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks of the World and a matron of the Prince Hall Order of the Eastern Star.

Legacy and recognition

Nassau's Mary Ingraham Intergenerational Care Centre in Nassau was Ingraham. The centre is operated for the government by the South Bahamas Conference of the Inter-American Division of Seventh-day Adventists.

On 10 October 2012, the Post Office, issued six commemorative stamps, titled 50th Anniversary of Women Suffrage, one each bearing the portrait of a notable woman who influenced women's suffrage in the Bahamas in the following denominations:^[4]

1. Mary Ingraham – 15¢
2. Georgianna Symonette (1902–1965) – 25¢
3. Mabel Walker (1902–1987) – 50¢
4. Eugenia Lockhart (1908–  ??) – 65¢
5. Dame Alberta Isaacs – 70¢
6. Dame Doris Johnson (1921–1983) – 80¢