The First 50 Years

EARLY HISTORY AND FOUNDING

The College Club of Cincinnati was founded in 1892 by eight young women in their twenties. Miss Susan Peabody and seven of her friends initially met in her parents’ home on McGregor Avenue near Auburn. Susan Peabody and three others had graduated from Wellesley College, and membership was limited to Eastern colleges and state universities in Ohio. 

In establishing their own collegiate club, these young women had already demonstrated a streak of independence and sidestepped organizational hurdles. After graduating from Wellesley in 1886, Susan Peabody had been appointed Director for Ohio by the then-new Association of Collegiate Alumnae (now the Association of University Women). A survey of college graduates in Ohio found that the majority lived in the northern part of the state: therefore, the headquarters for this territory was established in Cleveland. A small group appealed to Miss Peabody to organize a branch in Cincinnati. Because the Association of Collegiate Alumnae required that its members be graduates of accredited four-year colleges and some of the Cincinnati group had attended college only two years, however, they decided to form an independent organization.

In the spring of 1892, Miss Peabody returned to Cincinnati from Chicago, where she was teaching, to give her blessing and be hostess to the club at its first meeting. In attendance were Elizabeth R. Kellogg, Sarah Hickenlooper, who later became Mrs. John M. Withrow; Mary L. McMillan; Helen Sage, later Mrs. Fran W. Cottle; Adelaide Miller (Mrs. William Henry Walker); Ada Bremfoerder (Mrs. George Bassett); and Jessie Clinton (Mrs. Lelan Banning), who became the first President. 

Currently, our history reflects graduates from Smith, Vassar, Bryn Mawr, Mount Holyoke as well as The Ohio State University and the University of Cincinnati as well as many other academic institutions.