ELWYN B. ROBINSON DEPARTMENT OF SPECIAL COLLECTIONS
CHESTER FRITZ LIBRARY
UNIVERSITY OF NORTH DAKOTA
GRAND FORKS, NORTH DAKOTA 58202
COLLECTION: OGL#1321
DATES:1883-1993
SIZE: .25 linear feet
ACQUISITION:The Anna Victoria Kirk Papers were deposited in the Orin G. Libby Manuscript Collection by Dorothy Ann Kirk, Anna's daughter on December 4, 1995 (Acc.#95-2048).
ACCESSION:Open for inspection under the rules and regulationsof the Department of Special Collections.
Anna Victoria Cunningham was born February 25, 1883 to William Bamford and Alice Delcina Woodward Cunningham in Victoria County on Victoria Road, three miles from Lindsay, Ontario. She entered the United States from Ontario with her parents when she was approximately eighteen months old.
On January 24, 1905, Anna V. Cunningham and Ernest L. Kirk were married at Lakota, ND and they resided at Niagara, ND. Anna joined the North Dakota Woman's Christian Temperance Union (W.C.T.U.) in 1908 and was elected president of the Niagara Union in 1909. At the 21st Annual Convention of W.C.T.U. in 1910, she was appointed Vice President for Nelson county.
Anna Kirk wrote articles and letters pertaining to suffrage, politics, and her experiences related to W.C.T.U. which were published in several newspapers. From 1909 to 1911, she took part in five writing contests, winning silver and gold medals.
In 1912, Mrs. Kirk was a Progressive Party delegate from Nelson county to the Party's convention in Fargo, ND, which was the first convention women attended as voting delegates in North Dakota. Anna also worked with the Red Cross auxiliary during 1917, knitting stockings, wristlets, and sweaters, and was the first woman to serve on a grand jury in North Dakota, in Grand Forks County District Court, 1925.
Ernest and Anna Kirk resided at Niagara until 1931, when they moved to a farm near Mallory, MN. Anna died in 1965 and is survived by her three children, Sidney, Harvey, and Dorothy Ann Kirk.
The Anna V. Kirk Papers consist of a scrapbook, photographs, family history, and information pertaining to a Grand Forks 1925 trial where Anna Kirk served as a jury member.
Anna created the scrapbook, which contains photographs of the groups of which she was a member, ribbons from the W.C.T.U. annual conventions, and newspaper articles, many written by Anna, about women and politics, suffrage, and W.C.T.U. activity. She personalized the scrapbook with her selection of poems, quotes, and pictures of people, such as past Presidents of the United States, that inspired her.
Two photographs are included in the collection. One photograph, dated 1925, is that of a Grand Forks grand jury. Anna V. Kirk is pictured as the first and only woman up to that time to serve on a jury in Grand Forks County District Court. The other photograph is a portrait of Anna V. Kirk, dated July, 1962.
A family history contains a brief biography of Ernest Kirk, Anna's husband, and their children, Sidney, Harvey, and Dorothy Ann. Also included is an article written by Milt Winger, which resulted from an interview with Dorothy Ann Kirk, Anna's only daughter, on December 6, 1993.
The final item explains the 1925 trial and those involved with its proceedings.
Folder
1 Scrapbook, 1908-1929
2 Family History
3 Trial, 1925
The following photographs have been separated and placed in the Orin G. Libby Photographic Collection:
OGL 1321 - 1 Grand jury, Grand Forks County District Court; Anna V. Kirk is pictured as the first and only woman to serve on this jury, ca. 1925
OGL 1321 - 2 Portrait of Anna V. Kirk, ca. July, 1962
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