Hutson, Ethel. | Tulane University Special Collections

Ethel Hutson (1872-1951) was the daughter of Charles Woodward Hutson, a Louisiana State University professor and artist, and Mary Jane Lockett. She went to college at the University of Mississippi and Texas A & M. In addition, she studied art with Cary Lockett McAuley at the Art Student League, the National Academy of Design, the Pratt Institute, and Newcomb College. She began her career designing tiles in Indianapolis and drawing illustrations and writing articles for Readers Magazine. She then taught art in Texas public schools and privately and in 1909, began to do art work and to write feature articles for the New Orleans Picayune.

In 1912 she became head of the woman's department of the New Orleans Item and became active in local woman's organizations. As a member of the Era Club she focused on health care issues and rising prices in the New Orleans area. She became an active member and later press officer of the Woman's Suffrage Party of New Orleans, which was an outgrowth of the Era Club, but divided politically into two factions: States' rights versus the United States Constitution. The first state convention of the Party was in New Orleans in 1913 and continued in several forms until suffrage passed, at which point it dissolved and reemerged as the League of Women Voters.

Ethel Hutson was the Secretary-Treasurer of the Southern States Art League. She helped to collect part of the Southern States Art League records and some was given to her by the Woodward family.