Women’s History Month is observed every March, and International Women’s Day is celebrated on March 8 of each year. From Harding’s early beginnings to the present day, women have played a profound role in the growth and development of the university.
From 1889 to 1933, Galloway Women’s College called Searcy its home. In 1934, then-Harding College purchased the Searcy campus.
There have been 53 different women’s social clubs that have existed in Harding’s history, the first one being Woodson Harding Comrades (WHC). Inaugural first lady Woodson Harding Armstrong, daughter of James A. Harding and Pattie Cobb Harding, chartered the club and later served as a long-time sponsor. The oldest women’s social club still in existence is Ju Go Ju (JGJ), but Zeta Rho has consistently been the largest club on campus, according to archives and special collections librarian Hannah Wood.
The May Fete was a spring festival that was traditionally celebrated by Galloway, and from 1936 to 1990, JGJ continued the tradition. As a part of these festivities, one member from each women’s social club was elected to represent her club in the winding of the May Pole. These representatives would attend 6 a.m. practices for weeks in preparation for the May Fete, often resulting in women falling asleep while rehearsing and pulling the entire pole down with them, according to Harding History House curator and Women for Harding president Debbie Howard.
Howard said that while she was a Harding student, she was chosen as Zeta Rho’s representative to wind the May Pole.
“In 1976 when I was a freshman, I actually was that girl,” Howard said. “Initially I thought it was a huge honor to be chosen. At the time, there was a lot of camaraderie with the different (women’s) clubs. You had your streamer, and you had to take so many steps, (then) you’d raise your streamer, and somebody else would go under it, and by the time you were done, you have this pretty design wrapped around the May Pole.”
The first ladies have been Woodson Harding Armstrong, Sallie Hockaday Benson, Louise Nicholas Ganus, Leah Gentry Burks and Ann Hutson McLarty.
Deborah Duke, associate professor of mathematics and the daughter of Chancellor Emeritus Cliff Ganus and Louise Nicholas Ganus, said that a lot of the hard work that women, including her mother, did was behind the scenes.
“Nowadays we have Aramark, this wonderful Heritage building with meeting rooms and Cone Chapel; it wasn’t like that back then,” Duke said. “If an important visitor came from out of town to speak, say, at American Studies, dinner for them was likely to be in the first lady’s home. It was up to my mother to do most of the cooking — or all of the cooking. She ended up washing a lot of the dishes, she had to clean her house; those first ladies back then played a huge role in hospitality.”
According to Wood, some of the most important women on Harding’s campus may not be well-known.
“I was a Harding student, and some of the women that I remember are the dorm moms and club sponsors,” Wood said. “There are a lot of women whose names might not be on buildings but that had a lot of influence through the years. Those are some of the women that really make a strong impact on this campus without all that name recognition.”
