Edith Claire Bryce

Edith Claire Cram ( Bryce; May 6, 1880 – February 28, 1960) was an American peace activist and heiress. She founded Peace House, which produced anti-war and peace movement lectures, newspaper advertisements, and other propaganda to promote peace. She was a benefactor for the War Resisters League.

During World War I, she expressed her pacifist views in newspapers in Chicago, New York, and Washington. She wrote an open letter to President Franklin D. Roosevelt during World War II, in which she asked him to mediate. She also promoted women's rights, specifically advocating for birth control. She was on the Advisory Council at Cooper Union for women's educational fields.

Early life Edith Claire Bryce was born on May 6, 1880, in New York County, New York. Her parents were General Lloyd Stephens Bryce, the United States Ambassador to the Netherlands, and Edith (née Cooper) Bryce, the only child of New York City Mayor Edward Cooper, the son of prominent industrialist Peter Cooper. (She is related to Colonial Governor Robert Brooke Sr.) through her father's family.

Her sister, Cornelia (1881–1960), was married to conservationist Gifford Pinchot (1865–1946), the first Chief of the United States Forest Service under Theodore Roosevelt, in 1914. Her brother, Peter Cooper Bryce (1889–1964), married Angelica Schuyler Brown (1890–1980), of the Brown banking family, in 1917.

Pacifist

During World War I, she became a pacifist and used the print media to promote her views. She created advertisements and content for religious pages of Chicago, New York, and Washington newspapers.

A leader in the pacifist movement, Also engaged in anti-war activities, it was established in 1923 in New York City. The organization conducted plays, lectures, and exhibits. It counseled conscientious objectors. The War Resisters League, of which she was a benefactor, helped her with anti-war advertisements and peace propaganda. Funded totally by her, the Peace House reached millions as the result of its propaganda campaigns. A common message on posters was "Too young to vote but not too young to be killed." During World War II, she advocated for complete neutrality in the armed conflict. She held a meeting at Carnegie Hall in 1939 where senators and representatives of Congress, who wanted to lift the arms embargo, addressed calls for peace. At Cooper Union, she was on the Advisory Council for the Woman's Art School, School of Secretarial Training, and the School of Telegraphy for Women.

Personal life

She married John Sergeant Cram (1851–1936) president of the Dock Board, and the Public Service Commissioner. The Tammany Hall leader, Charles Francis Murphy, was a political intimate. Cram later married Ruth Vaux, a granddaughter of Richard Vaux, after his first wife's death. Their second child, Edith Bryce Cram (1908–1972), married Arthur Gerhard in 1950. Their third child, John Sergeant Cram was born ca. 1910. and at their residence on Fifth Avenue (across from Central Park) in Manhattan. (The Cram family had seven servants, including a governess, butler, maid, cook, waitress, nurse, and housekeeper.) (Her date of death is February 28, 1960 according to The New York Times and the New York City Department of Health.) The lineage of Colonial Governors book states that she was born on February 29.