Matilda Bradley Carse
Matilda Bradley Carse was a prominent temperance leader born in Saintfield, Ireland, in 1832. As a Presbyterian of Scottish descent, she emigrated to the United States in 1858, settling in Chicago, where she married Thomas Carse and raised three sons. Following her husband's death and the tragic loss of her youngest son to an accident involving an intoxicated driver, Carse dedicated herself to combating alcoholism and advocating for social reform. She became president of the Chicago Central Woman's Christian Temperance Union (WCTU) in 1878 and remained in that position until her death. Carse was instrumental in establishing support services for women, including nurseries and kindergartens, and she played a key role in consolidating the WCTU's publications, leading to the launch of the influential Union Signal newspaper. Despite facing challenges, including a financial setback related to the Woman's Temple project, Carse's contributions to the temperance movement and charitable work were significant. She continued her reform efforts until her retirement in 1913, eventually passing away in 1914 in New York. Carse's legacy is marked by her dedication to social issues and her pioneering efforts in women's publications.
Subject Terms
Matilda Bradley Carse
- Matilda Carse
- Born: November 19, 1835
- Died: June 3, 1917
Temperance leader, was born in Saintfield, Ireland. A Presbyterian of Scottish descent, she was the daughter of John Bradley, a linen merchant, and Catherine (Cle-land) Bradley. She was educated in Ireland, emigrating to the United States in 1858. She settled in Chicago, where in 1861 she married Thomas Carse, a railroad freight agent; they had three sons: David Bradley, Thomas Alexander, and John Bradley.
After her husband’s death in 1869, Carse became involved in charity work. Her life took a sudden and traumatic turn in 1874, when her youngest son was run over and killed by an intoxicated wagon driver, and she thereupon dedicated herself to the extirpation of drunkenness. She joined the Chicago Central Woman’s Christian Temperance Union (WCTU), which was affiliated with the newly founded national WCTU, and became its president in 1878. She held that office until her death.
Carse’s approach to reform was in complete harmony with that of national WCTU president Frances E. Willard. Both women believed that alcoholism was merely one aspect of a complex social and economic phenomenon. Both were eager to provide women, especially working women, with support services that were often lacking in cities and towns. Carse, as president of the Chicago WCTU, helped start the Bethes-da Day Nursery for working mothers, the Anchorage Mission for young women, two dispensaries for the poor, two kindergartens, and several other charitable organizations.
Her greatest contribution to reform, however, was her skill as a publisher. The national WCTU, which was becoming a major reform force, lacked a single publication that went to all its members. Willard put Carse in charge of consolidating the various Union magazines and papers, some of which were debt-ridden and poorly run, into a few strong publications. In 1880 Carse established the Woman’s Temperance Publishing Association, an independent stock company, capitalized with five thousand dollars in stock (sold to women only). With this company she reorganized the WCTU’s publishing program. In 1883 there first appeared the Union Signal, the weekly paper that is still the official organ of the national WCTU.
The stock company, situated in Chicago, quickly developed into the Union’s official publishing arm. Carse directed the business side and also had considerable influence over editorial policy. She was extremely successful. By 1884 the Union Signal was the largest-selling temperance paper in the country, with a circulation of nearly 100,000, and by 1890 it was the largest women’s paper in the world. Numerous other publications were begun, including the Young Crusader, the Oak and Ivy Leaf, and a German-language temperance paper. The printing plant acquired the most modern equipment, did a large business for outside customers, employed over a hundred people by 1890, and returned an annual dividend of seven percent.
Then, after more than twenty years of unbroken success, Carse encountered a setback that destroyed her business career. In 1887 she founded another private stock company, also in Chicago, to raise money for an office building, the Woman’s Temple. Rents from the building would repay the investors, including the national WCTU and many of its officers and members, and would allow the WCTU to have its national headquarters in the building rent free.
Unfortunately, construction was completed just before the financial panic of 1893, and the drastic fall in business made it impossible to find enough tenants. Carse’s appeals to the WCTU for money to pay the debt service contributed to discord within the organization. In 1898, after the death of Frances Willard, who supported both Carse and the Temple, the WCTU membership voted to disassociate itself from the building and sell its interest at a loss. That same year Carse resigned her job in the publishing company. In 1903 the company was dissolved and the Union Signal was purchased by the national WCTU.
For the next ten years Matilda Carse participated in reform and charitable work in Chicago. After her retirement from these activities in 1913, she lived with her son David in Park Hill-on-Hudson, New York, where she died at eighty-one of heart disease. She was buried in Rose Hill Cemetery in Chicago.
The best sources for Carse’s life are the sketches in F. E. Willard and M. A. Livermore, eds., A Woman of the Century (1893; reprinted 1967), and Notable American Women (1971), Her publishing activities and the debacle of the Woman’s Temple are discussed in R. Bordin, Woman and Temperance (1981).