Queen Anne Girl in the Boat: Helen Tillman Zednick
1907 Photograph: Helen second from the left. Coach Hiram Conibear in rear. Photo: 1900-1909 - Washington Rowing. Referenced 12/18/23
In this month of December 2023, when the film of Daniel James Brown’s story, The Boys in the Boat, opens and highlights the uplifting story of the men’s crew that won gold medals at the 1936 Berlin Olympic Games, it excites local pride to learn of a Queen Anne connection to the early history of rowing at the University of Washington. In the case of women’s crew at the turn of the 20th c., you won’t find a group of working-class people at a time of economic peril like those in Brown’s book, nor are you able to cheer great victors in some international contest at a pivotal point in world history.
You can, however, appreciate the significance of a small group of women including our Queen Anne hero Helen Catherine Tillman, who between 1905 and 1909, rowed crew at the UW. Helen was among a small group of women who chose to go to the UW and simultaneously challenge the role of women in society prior to the 1920 passage of the 19th amendment to the Constitution giving women the right to vote.
Helen’s story attracts me for many personal reasons. Among them, I know where she lived for almost her entire life; she shares my daughter’s birthday (May 20) and, like my daughter, she acquired her home at 1611 Sixth Ave. W. from her parents. It also interests me that her life story is called out in a short article written by her daughter (Helen Mercier) in the Queen Anne Historical Society’s 1993 book, Queen Anne: Community on the Hill where I discovered a bundle of interesting facts and quite a few errors. ([Queen Anne Historical Society. Queen Anne: Community on the Hill. p. 100.)
1611 Sixth Ave. W. Looking west in the rain. Author’s photo. December 4, 2023
Two powerful third story gables, stucco wall surfaces and bands of timber framing in those gables mark the house at 1611 Sixth Ave. W. Since it plays no structural role, the timber framing really should be called faux. It is true though that Helen Tillman’s mother, Florence, and her stepfather Lee Wheeler, built it in 1908 (Seattle Daily Times, July 26, 1908.) while she attended the UW and joined the girls’ (to use the anachronistic term of the day) rowing team.
Helen Tillman’s parents lived in Contra Costa, California in 1888 when she was born and where her father died when she was only four. I have not confirmed when she moved to Seattle or if the family came directly to Queen Anne. Her daughter’s article in Queen Anne: Community of the Hill noted that Tillman grew up in Seattle, but she got the decade wrong! I haven’t looked for the Tillman name in city directories, nor do I know where Helen went to elementary or high school. I do know that she was brought up in the Catholic church and was a very good violinist.
According to a piece published in 1999 on Historylink.org by Greg Lange, rowing came to the University of Washington through the good works of E. F. Blaine, a lawyer and east coast transplant who had at least observed rowing at Cornell University in Ithaca, N.Y. In 1899, Blaine gave and raised money to build a couple of training gigs that could also be raced. Lange’s article notes that the first college rowing race on the West Coast between the UW and California did not take place until June 1903. Lange omits that women took part in rowing from almost the beginning (Greg Lange, Rowing begins at University of Washington on December 15, 1899. HistoryLink.org. Essay 1647.).
As much as having boats to row and boathouses in which to store them, the successful growth of rowing at the UW, hinged on the engagement of a coach, Hiram B. Conibear, whose rowing style empowered the university’s teams from 1906 until his death in 1917, and according to some, throughout the entire first half of the 20th c. It was also Conibear who found and engaged the Pocock family that built the marvelously winning shells.
At the end of April 1907, Conibear announced that the men and women would form into rowing clubs, “each club will be named after some noted woman and will compete with the others, thus arousing more interest and competition in women’s rowing at Washington.” (The Daily Pacific Wave, April 16, 1909) Conibear picked two captains for the women (Ada Etsell and Gretchen O’Donnell) and four captains for the men. Each captain was responsible to pick the other members. The Wave stated that “Both the men’s and women’s crew clubs are well started. The members are selected and from now on the competition for admission will be keen.” The women’s clubs were made up of Misses Tillman, Whittle, Etsell, Conner, Godfrey, O’Donnell and Lucas in the first club; and Misses Buckley, Latham, Rankin, Tanner, Drake, Richardson and Harkins in the second club.
Washingtonrowing.com thoroughly documents the history of women rowing at the UW with a long and comprehensive review of the years 1903-1909 (https://washingtonrowing.com/history/womens-history/1900-1909/). Even though women rowed briefly in the teens, the website suspends the story in 1909 noting that women didn’t row for the UW again until the 1970s (Sudermann, Hannalore. Making Waves, University of Washington Alumni Magazine, September 2023. Referenced online at Like the ‘Boys in the Boat,’ UW women’s rowing has its own inspiring story | UW Magazine — University of Washington Magazine). Although on the cusp of competing nationally, women’s crew ended riding on ideas that women shouldn’t exert themselves, on the impropriety of their outfits and the sad truth that they had no west coast crews against which to compete.
Helen Tillman in the 1907 Tyee
None of this male prejudice stood in the way of our Queen Anne girl. The caption on her photograph presents her as an example of the stalwart women who attended the university in that first decade of the 20th century:
Helen C. Tillman, oarswoman, who on top of being a History major, listed in the Tyee the following as activities: Pirates of Penzance (1); Orchestra (2), (3); Crew (2), (3); Secretary of Class (3); Tyee Staff (3); Glee Club (3); Farce Cast (3); Wave Staff (3); YWCA (1), (2), (3); Woman's League Com; Junior Party. This was not atypical of the women on campus in the early years; strong, self-confident, intelligent and active, they were, by most indications, respected and appreciated by their male counterparts. This at a time in broader society where women were not considered compatible in a board room, held very few leadership positions, and would not gain the right to vote for another twelve years.
The following article from the Seattle Daily Times underscores Helen’s university achievements:
Helen Mercier claims in her Community on the Hill squib that her mom graduated in 1911 with a major in journalism, but the UW catalog states she received her diploma on May 30, 1909 (General Catalogue of the University of Washington 1909, p. 294). Although the caption cited above calls out history as her major, the 1909 catalog says she majored in Spanish. Mercier’s troublesome article claims Helen married Victor Zednick, a state legislator and future lieutenant governor, in 1914, but an article in the Seattle Daily Times noted their marriage in Oakland, California on December 4, 1911 (Seattle Daily Times, December 5, 1911, p. 13.) Zednick, who graduated from the UW two years ahead of Helen in 1907, became in 1908 the Graduate Manager of UW sports, now we’d call him the Athletic Director. In those days, the Graduate Manager worked for the Associated Students of the U.W. In fact, in her senior year Helen was overwhelmingly elected Secretary of the Associated Students, making her, at least technically, her future husband’s boss.
Helen’s story troubles me. She is an accomplished violinist, loves the theater, stands out in student government, does exceptionally well in school and rows! By my 21st c. standard she would qualify for an outstanding career in business, government, the arts, or even academia, yet within one year of graduating from university, Helen marries Zednick, an aspiring politician and the person in charge of student athletics at the UW. Following her marriage, she hosts dances, card parties, teas and luncheons, founds a literary club for equally privileged women, and finds herself appointed to local commissions and boards.
Like many women in the 1920s, Helen capitalizes on her husband’s prominence as a state legislator and her own membership in prominent women’s clubs. She is named to committees and attracts the attention of Seattle Mayor Bertha Landes. Secretary of Commerce Herbert Hoover (future U.S. President) assigns her an important role as director of the Better Homes in America of the Northwest (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Better_Homes_in_America. Cited December 12, 2023.). Between 1910 and 1930, she is mentioned well over four hundred times in the society pages of the Seattle Daily Times. Standing out for years as a talented violinist, she is soon the stay-at-home mother of three daughters, Phyllis (b. 1916), Florence (b. 1918) and Helen (b. 1922) who was married in St. Anne’s Rectory in 1942.
The most important reason for celebrating Helen Tillman Zednick is how she triumphs politically and socially while exploiting the limited tools available to women in the first half of the twentieth century. It is true she did not become a professor, doctor, or businessperson, but she did take advantage of her physical strength and abilities, musical talent, social privilege, and political connections to achieve local prominence and influence (Helen who died in 1978 at 87 and Victor who died in 1959 at 74 are buried in Calvary Cemetery.). And like those famous boys in the boat, she rowed!