Gertrude Foster Brown

Gertrude Foster Brown (Mrs. Arthur Raymond Brown, July 29, 1867 – March 1, 1956) was a concert pianist, teacher, and suffragist. Following the passage of women suffrage in New York State in 1917, and pending passage of the Nineteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution, She was Director-General of the Women's Overseas Hospitals in France, founded by suffragists, in 1918. In addition to her work in the New York suffrage movement, she helped to found the National League of Women Voters. She was the Managing Director of the Woman's Journal from 1921-1931.

Early years Gertrude Foster was born on July 29, 1867, in Morrison, Illinois, to William Charles Foster and Lydia Anne Drake.

Foster studied piano at the New England Conservatory of Music in Boston, Massachusetts. She finished a four-year course in two years, graduating in August 1885. After teaching for a year in Dayton, Ohio, she went to Europe, studying with Xaver Scharwenka in Berlin and Élie-Miriam Delaborde in Paris joining the Chicago Conservatory of Music, where she taught and performed until 1896.

In August 1893, Gertrude Foster married Arthur Raymond Brown (1865-1944), an artist and advertising executive who worked for the Chicago Evening Post. In 1896, they moved to New York City, where Raymond Brown worked for the Hawley Advertising Company. which later became part of Carrie Chapman Catt's Woman Suffrage Party. Brown attended the National American Woman Suffrage Association (NAWSA) convention in 1910. Among her activities were the organization of suffrage parades in New York City. How It Feels to Be the Husband of a Suffragette, which was published anonymously in 1915, has been attributed to her husband.

Brown was active in campaigning in New York for the passage of women's suffrage. Victory there on November 6, 1917, was an important step towards the passage of the Nineteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution. Following the passage of women suffrage in New York State in 1917, and pending passage of the Nineteenth Amendment, Brown wrote Your Vote and How to Use It. It was published in February 1918 by Harper & Brothers,

Your Vote and How to Use It was one of a number of "citizenship manuals" educating women in their new rights and responsibilities and encouraging them to take their new obligations seriously. The book itself was listed as suggested civics reading for Girl Guides who wanted to earn a Citizen's Badge, in the 1920 guides handbook Scouting for Girls.

In 1918, when the suffrage movement organized the Women's Overseas Hospitals in France, Gertrude Foster Brown became Director-General, serving in France. Seventy-four women staff were sent over from the United States to the hospital. During World War II, she was active in the Women's Action Committee for Victory and Lasting Peace. In 1945, she represented the committee at the founding United Nations Conference on International Organization in San Francisco, California.

Among her papers is an autobiographical account of her life, Suffrage and Music: My First Eighty Years.