Abigail Jane Scott was one of eleven children born to John and Anne Scott, near Groveland, Illinois.
At age seventeen, her family moved to Oregon, in a wagon pulled by oxen, over the Oregon Trail. Her mother, and one of her brothers died during their move. The rest of the family settled in Lafayette.
She married Benjamin Duniway, producing a daughter, and five sons. They lived on a backwoods farm", where Abigail wrote, and published a novel "Captain Gray's Company". It was the first book commercially published in Oregon.
Unbeknownst to her, her husband made a bad financial deal, and, they literally lost the farm. Then, he was injured, badly. Abigail had to support the family.
For awhile, she ran a school, then, she opened a millenary and notions shops. She sold it, eventually, and moved her family to Portland. Her husband got a job with the U.S. customs service there. She began to work for women's rights and the suffrage movement in the Pacific Northwest. She founded a newspaper called "New Northwest, and served as its editor, and writer. One of her brothers also ran a paper in Portland, and was very much against suffrage, and his sister. She also published her own serialized novels in her paper. She also managed a northwest speaking tour for Susan B. Anthony. She continued her work with suffrage, and founded the Oregon State Women Suffrage Association, and organized the Oregon State Equal Suffrage Association, of which she was the president. During this time, she was criticized, and attacked, both verbally, and physically. Sadly, her only daughter died at age thirty one, of tuberculosis, and that same year, the women's suffrage referendum failed in Oregon, and her organization fell apart. She moved to Idaho, where she lived for the next eight years. She continued to work for the suffrage movement in Idaho, where the suffrage referendum passed.
She returned to Oregon, and revived her suffrage association, and started another publication, "The Pacific Empire". This paper also was for suffrage, and, had her novels in them. Once again, she was under attack. Years went by, with many, many defeats of any suffrage referendum. Finally, in 1912, one passed, and the governor of the state asked Abigail Scott Duniway to write the proclamation, in recognition of her long struggle. She was the first woman in her county to register to vote, and was the first woman in the state of Oregon to vote.
She completed, and published her autobiography, then died in 1915.
