WILMINGTON — Pettee Memorial Library presents “Susan B. Anthony – The Invincible!” at Memorial Hall on West Main Street in Wilmington on Saturday, Sept. 29, at 3 p.m.
Sally Matson has been touring the country as the feisty activist in this one-woman show for nine years.
“People need to know about this woman who fought for abolition, women's rights, and woman suffrage,” explained Matson. “Anthony's influence still resonates in our society; women and minorities continue to fight for equity.”
A graduate of the Northwestern University School of Communications, Matson has been acting and directing for 30 years. She studied writing at the University of Virginia Extension and Manhattanville College.
She has performed in a Department of Defense show in the Pacific, was a writer and interviewer on Connecticut cable television, and was most recently a teacher at the American Textile History Museum in Lowell. She currently resides in Andover, Mass.
Matson uses letters, speeches and diaries in the play to reveal Anthony's wit and fury and to note her interactions with such historical figures as Frederick Douglass, Harriet Tubman, William Lloyd Garrison, Horace Greeley, and Elizabeth Cady Stanton.
Her words transport the audience to the time of the Underground Railroad, the Civil War, fights over constitutional amendments, and westward expansion.
“I am on the road now and that is exactly what she did,” said Matson, whose current touring somewhat mirrors Anthony's road trips in the 1800s. “I am spreading her story, her mission. Would she be happy with our progress? Come to join the discussion.”
For more information, call librarian Amity DeAngelis at 802-464-8557 or visit www.petteelibrary.org.