On 12 December 1917, Carrie Chapman Catt, a long-time leader of the worldwide woman suffrage movement, wrote to Henry Fairfield Osborn, director of the American Museum of Natural History in New York. Catt inquired whether Osborn would sign a petition in support of the pending suffrage amendment which was intended to include the signatures of "1000 men whose names we have chosen on account of quality and influence."' Given Osborn's standing in academic, scientific, and political circles, he was a likely enough figure for Catt to turn to in her strategy of developing and publicizing elite support for the federal amendment drive.