This is backstory. I'm Peter Onof.

Tonight we've reached a milestone in our nation's march toward a more perfect union.

The first time that a major party has dominated a woman or president.

In Philadelphia, Hillary Rotom Clinton moved one step closer to becoming the first female president of the United States.

Clinton stands on the shoulders of generations of women who fought for the right to vote.

But even before they won that right in 1920, women found ways to influence politics.

In the spring of 1863, a Confederate woman led a hungry mob of several hundred demanding bread or blood.

She told these women, to come tomorrow, we're going to have a riot. You'll need a babysitter and come armed.

From Dolly Madison's parlor politics to other women who sought the White House, a history of women and politics today on backstory.

Major funding for backstory is provided by the ShiaCon Foundation, the National Endowment for the Humanities, the Joseph and Robert Cornell Memorial Foundation and the Arthur Vining Davis Foundations.

From the Virginia Foundation for the Humanities, this is backstory.

With the American History Guys.

Welcome to the show. I'm Brian Ballot and I'm here with Ed Ayers.

Hey Brian, and Peter Onifs with us.

Hey there Brian.

We're going to start today in 1920 in the scenic town of Jackson, Wyoming known today as Jackson Hole.

A very small town of about 350 people nestled in a mountain valley and so it's absolutely gorgeous.

This is Sherry Smith. She's a historian at Southern Methodist University and a resident of Moose, Wyoming.

That's near Jackson. Smith says that in 1920, Jackson wasn't so gorgeous.

The streets were full of mud and the town square was full of garbage and place was frankly a mess.

It had no sewage system, no street lights, no official cemetery and barely any money in the town coffers.

This disrepair prompted the residents to call a meeting with the town's elected officials.

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