1884-1966
Margaret Haines was a lifelong resident of Newark. She was a member of the General Assembly from 1949-1953, taught at Garfield and Avon Ave Schools, was a canteen worker and ambulance driver in WWI and a Signal corps driver and USO Organizer in Newark in WWII.
The Newark News called her “the antithesis of the traditional view of a school marm. Miss Haines…invaded the traditional domain of men.”
As an Assembly member, Margaret crusaded against sale of switchblade knives, famously pulling out a switchblade during an Assembly Session to prove her point.
Margaret was involved in a host of political, social, and civic organizations. She was President of the National Order of Women Legislator, a member of the Women’s Overseas League, Essex County State Women’s Republican Club and the NJ Retired Teacher’s Association. She was also a member of the Essex County Welfare Board, the DAR and the NJ Cripped Children’s Commission, on the board of the Newark YMWCA and on the volunteer committee at Lyons Hospital. She was President of the Eighth Ward Republican Club and on the guilds of St. Barnabas and Presbyterian Hospitals.
Margaret was the sister of Florence Haines, and like her sister was also active in the suffrage movement, although specifics haven’t been researched, she was a member of the Women’s Political Union. They were the first sisters to serve on the New Jersey Assembly. Mariana was a graduate of Barringer in Jan 1904 and the Normal School in 1906. She lived at 311 Mount Prospect Ave at the time of her death and previously at 34 Franklin and 287 DeGraw.
Bibliography
“Mrs. MD Haines, Former Assemblywoman, Teacher” Newark News Nov 26, 1966
Cummings, Charles. “Meet the exemplary women who enriched the city” Star Ledger Jun 6, 2002
Florence Haines, Suffrage Database
H-03, Haines, Margaret, Assemblywoman, Newark News Morgue, Newark Public Library
Rutgers University Photo: https://blogs.libraries.rutgers.edu/ballotnj/items/show/27
“Miss Haines Makes Point in Assembly” Star Ledger Mar 18, 1952
“Essex Delegation” Star Ledger Jan 11, 1950
“Miss M Haines, Was In Assembly” Asbury Park Press, Nov 27, 1966
Passport photo, Ancestry.com
Board of Education Report, 1906
“Conduct Class Day Exercises” Newark News Jan 27, 1904
Census records