Seneca Falls: The Birthplace of Women's Rights

Updated August 5, 2020 | Infoplease Staff

Seneca Falls: The Birthplace of Women's Rights

Some people consider the single most important place in U.S. women's history to be Seneca Falls, New York, where on July 19, 1848, the first women's rights convention was held. Seneca Falls was the home of Elizabeth Cady Stanton, who, along with abolitionist Lucretia Mott, organized the convention.

The National Women's Hall of Fame was founded in 1969 in Seneca Falls. The Hall inducts distinguished women and offers programs and exhibits in Seneca Falls; New York's Finger Lakes area; Washington, DC; and elsewhere. The mission of the National Women's Hall of Fame is: “To honor in perpetuity those women, citizens of the United States of America, whose contributions to the arts, athletics, business, education, government, the humanities, philanthropy and science, have been the greatest value …”

Since 1980 Seneca Falls has also been the site of the Women's Rights National Historic Park. Among its numerous features are the chapel where the 1848 convention was held; a 100-foot-long wall engraved with the “Declaration of Sentiments,” an equal-rights proclamation that was signed at the convention; and the house where Stanton and her family lived after moving from Boston in 1847. Stanton said that the difficulty of daily life in Seneca Falls, where for the first time she was alone in caring for a large house and three small children, made her a feminist