Mrs. Philip Snowden: lecturer

              1909

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Mrs. Philip Snowden
LECTURER

LECTURE SUBJECTS

POLITICS, PROBLEMS, & PROGRESS IN GREAT BRITAIN.
PEEPS AT PARLIAMENT THROUGH A WOMAN'S EYES.
WOMAN SUFFRAGE IN ENGLAND.

Redpath-Slayton





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MRS. PHILIP SNOWDEN is only twenty-seven years old, and yet she is the most eloquent Englishwoman now living.  Not since Frances Willard has there been an English-speaking woman with such a gift of oratory, so much magnetism, or such persuasive sweetness of manner and ability to move great bodies of men and women.

The first impression you get when you see Mrs. Snowden is one of beauty and grace.  But aside from that, you cannot be in her presence for two minutes without realizing that she is a personage.  You feel her quiet strength, her reserve force, as palpable facts, and from the very first you are influenced by the charm of her simplicity and sincerity.  True sincerity is the most potent factor known to mankind in securing attention and deference, and that is the chief characteristic of Mrs. Snowden aside from all her eloquence.  A mass of fair, wavy hair surrounds a face at once placid and gentle and luminous.  To an unusual degree she is possessed of that personal magnetism that immediately enlists sympathy, and no one, in her case, can feel any incompatibility in a handsome woman defending and urging great causes.

Although her family are Wesleyan, and although she herself has been brought up in the Methodist faith, she often visited Pembroke Chapel where Dr. Charles F. Aked, perhaps the ablest Baptist divine, was then preaching.  It was during the distressing period of the Boer war that Mrs. Snowden first entered public life.  Dr. Aked was in those days a good deal of a storm centre.  So firm was the position he took in the matter of the war that his opponents were naturally bitter and numerous.  Controversy raged about this Baptist clergyman who denounced England with so much force and vehemence.

A meeting was held in Pembroke Chapel for the purpose of attesting the loyality of the congregation to the pastor.  On that evening, to the surprise of all present, but chiefly to the surprise of Mrs. Snowden herself, she arose before all that assembly and made a wonderful speech in defence of Dr. Aked.  It was then she realized that she possessed the gift of eloquence.  That constituted the beginning of her career as a public speaker, and since then she has been almost constantly before the public.


RSLB

REDPATH-SLAYTON, Boston, New York, Columbus, Chicago, Cedar Rapids, Kansas City, Denver, Butle, Portland

REDPATH-WHITE, 100 Boylston St., K. M. White. Mgr., Boston Mass

REDPATH-BROCKWAY, 6101 Penn Ave., Pittsburg, Pa.





Upon her graduation from the Liverpool Training College, she became a teacher in a school at Leeds, but her scholastic work did not long hold her exclusive attention.  Very soon she became identified with the Labor party, to which she has been of great assistance.  One of the very first movements she was identified with was in the nature of housecleaning in the very bodies she was championing.  She led a vigorous crusade against the heavy drinking of those days in Labor and Socialist clubs.  This work brought about her acquaintance with Philip Snowden, whom she married in 1905.

Ever since their marriage Mrs. Snowden has virtually lived in the House of Commons.  She has a wide acquaintance among legislators.  Often she has taken her husband's place before audiences, whom through invalidism, he could not meet, and it is recorded that on the evening after the Snowdens were married, Mrs. Snowden appeared before a large audience at a meeting to which he could not come.  Since then Mrs. Snowden has spoken in almost every industrial centre of England, Scotland, and Wales.  She even preaches a sermon now and then.

In 1907, when Dr. Aked's congregation at Pembroke was saying farewell to its pastor, who was going away to America, Mrs. Snowden preached a remarkably eloquent sermon in the church where only a few years ago she came as a young girl and listened in the gallery.  This time Dr. Aked and Philip Snowden, unusually able speakers themselves, sat spellbound while the young woman of five-and-twenty was preaching to them.  London newspapers sent men down to Liverpool to describe those farewell ceremonies, and the London Daily Mail reported that Crowded congregations assembled to see and hear the woman preacher, and Mrs. Snowden gave an exhibition of pulpit eloquence, depth of thought, and purity of diction that would have done credit to the best-known ecclesiastic.


In this country she delivered lectures at Chautauqua, last August, and daily filled the amphitheatre there, which seats five thousand.  She has also lectured at colleges and universities all the way from Minnesota to Louisiana.  Invariably she commands large audiences, and it is said of her that no man or woman in England since Spurgeon's day has come to the front so rapidly.—
Harper's Weekly, Nov. 28, 1908.



RSLB

REDPATH-SLAYTON, Boston, New York, Columbus, Chicago, Cedar Rapids, Kansas City, Denver, Butle, Portland

REDPATH-WHITE, 100 Boylston St., K. M. White. Mgr., Boston Mass

REDPATH-BROCKWAY, 6101 Penn Ave., Pittsburg, Pa.




PRESS NOTICES

As a speaker Mrs. Snowden has probably no equal among women.  She possesses in an extraordinary degree the gift of genuine oratory.  No one who has heard her will ever forget the rich, round tones of her voice.  Listening to the words as the volume swells and softens one is fascinated as by the song of a contralto soloist.  Her manner, too, is charming and attractive.  Frank, simple, and natural, the appeal is irresistible.  She wins the sympathy of the bitterest opponent by her transparent sincerity and earnestness.  The delivery is at once graceful and strong.  Mrs. Snowden has that arresting power of making her whole attitude and pose express the meaning of her message.  There is no artificial straining for effect, but quite naturally her body sways to the rhythm of her words.  Added to this the purity of the diction and the exquisite framing of the sentences make her speeches a delightful literary feast.  But these might be merely superficial talents.  It is possible for a speaker to possess them all and yet lack depth and vision.  But with these two qualities Mrs. Snowden is generously endowed.  There are few speakers who so often touch the real underlying principles of life.  She seems to reach the great hidden truths of every subject she approaches.  And her standpoint is as high as it is deep.  She is inspired by beautiful ideals and grand visions.  A glorious belief that humanity was meant to be as lovely as the flowers in the fields and the stars in the heavens uplifts her always.  It is this magnificent optimism which is the soul of her eloquence.  I am not surprised that Dr. Aked thinks Mrs. Snowden the greatest woman speaker since Frances Willard.—
The Christian Commonwealth, January 13, 1909.


Mrs. Philip Snowden is a young, beautiful woman with chestnut hair, rather tall, and possessing a voice of wonderful power and singular sweetness.—
New York Journal, December 5, 1908.


Mrs. Snowden, a young English orator, a latter-day Hypatia, speaks in the rich voice of authority, a finely modulated, ringing voice which gathers its power apparently from the sheer conviction of the speaker until it is like a big organ which sweeps the hearer resistlessly along on the tide of the argument.—
New York Sunday World, November 22, 1908.


In Carnegie Hall last night Mrs. Snowden's voice seemed to be pitched at a conventional drawing-room key, yet it penetrated to all parts of the hall, and so rapt was the attention of her bearers that it is probable that not a person present lost a word of what she was saying.  The applause lasted for five minutes after Mrs. Snowden sat down.—
New York Sun, December 5, 1908.


Mrs. Snowden, a handsome young woman with a clear, pleasing voice, was listened to with more interest than any of the other speakers.—
New York Herald, December 5, 1908.


Mrs. Snowden won the hearts of her hearers by her sweet tones and she was listened to eagerly for nearly an hour.—
New York American, December 5, 1908.


Queenly in appearance and manner, the young Englishwoman, with a voice of wonderful power and a magnetic tide of speech that seemed to leave no point uncovered, related the story of her country-women's battle for the ballot.—
New York World, December 5, 1908.


The most interest was shown in the speech of Mrs. Philip Snowden.  Her address was delivered with much dignity and oratorical ability.—
Evening Sun, December 5, 1908.



RSLB

REDPATH-SLAYTON, Boston, New York, Columbus, Chicago, Cedar Rapids, Kansas City, Denver, Butle, Portland

REDPATH-WHITE, 100 Boylston St., K. M. White. Mgr., Boston Mass

REDPATH-BROCKWAY, 6101 Penn Ave., Pittsburg, Pa.