Juanita Frances

She was born in Australia. She never knew her father, Timothy Lemont, and she was brought up by her mother who was a shop assistant. Her father was in the navy. She trained as a nurse and moved to the UK in the 1920s. While she was helping women in North Kensington she met and was inspired by the veteran suffragette Flora Drummond who was nicknamed "The General".

She became involved with the feminist Six Point Group after her arrival in England.Mary Stott, 'Obituary: Juanita Frances', The Guardian, 2 December 1992 The group wanted to get women's equality included in the work of the League of Nations and the "Equal Rights International Group" was formed and Frances was sent to Geneva where she had three unproductive meetings. She wanted to empower mothers and married women.{{Cite web|title=Records of the Married Women's Association - Archives Hub|url=https://archiveshub.jisc.ac.uk/data/gb106-5mwa|access-date=2020-08-24|website=archiveshub.jisc.ac.uk}}

She was instrumental in setting up the Married Women's Association in 1938, and later served as its president.{{cite book|author1=David Doughan|author2=Peter Gordon|title=Dictionary of British Women's Organisations, 1825-1960|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=T423AwAAQBAJ&pg=PA91|year=2014|publisher=Routledge|isbn=978-1-136-89770-2|page=91}} The first President of the MWA was Edith Summerskill and other notable recruits were Vera Brittain, the lawyer Helena Normanton and later in 1945 Lady Helen Nutting.{{Cite web|title=Papers of Lady Helen Nutting - Archives Hub|url=https://archiveshub.jisc.ac.uk/data/gb106-7lhn|access-date=2020-08-24|website=archiveshub.jisc.ac.uk}}

In 1947 after they had two children she divorced her husband, a banker named Gerald Leonard Schlesinger.{{Cite ODNB|title=Frances, Juanita [née Juanita Frances Lemont; married name Juanita Frances Schlesinger] (1901–1992), feminist activist and organizer|url=https://www.oxforddnb.com/view/10.1093/ref:odnb/9780198614128.001.0001/odnb-9780198614128-e-63847|access-date=2020-08-23| date=2004 |language=en|doi=10.1093/ref:odnb/63847| isbn=978-0-19-861412-8 }} The London house which he had built became the MWA's official headquarters.

1952 was the big split. Helena Normington was President and she took an independent line when presenting evidence to the Royal Commission on Marriage and Divorce. Rank and file objections were made that the approach favoured privileged women which was not the association's aim. The row resulted in a schism and the formation of the Council of Married Women led by Normanton, Doreen Gorsky, Evelyn Hamilton and Helen Nutting. These had been the President, Chair, Deputy Chair and Secretary, respectively, before their resignations. The Royal Commission would take five years to consider its position, reporting in 1956.{{Cite web|title=Royal Commission on Marriage and Divorce (Report) (Hansard, 19 March 1956)|url=https://api.parliament.uk/historic-hansard/commons/1956/mar/19/royal-commission-on-marriage-and-divorce|access-date=2020-08-24|website=api.parliament.uk}}

Brian Harrison recorded an oral history interview with Frances, in November 1974, as part of the Suffrage Interviews project, titled Oral evidence on the suffragette and suffragist movements: the Brian Harrison interviews.{{Cite web |last=London School of Economics and Political Science |title=The Suffrage Interviews |url=https://www.lse.ac.uk/library/collection-highlights/the-suffrage-interviews.aspx |access-date=2023-12-12 |website=London School of Economics and Political Science |language=en-GB}}   Frances discussed her role in the Women's Guild of Empire, setting up the Married Women's Association, and a number of prominent figures within the women's movement, including Flora Drummond, Teresa Billington-Greig, Dorothy Evans and Monica Whately.

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Category:1901 births

Category:1992 deaths

Category:British women's rights activists

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