Martha Waldron Janes

Martha Waldron Janes (June 9, 1832 – ?) was an American minister, social reformer, and columnist.

Born in Michigan, Janes educated herself by doing housework at US$1 a week. She was converted when very young, and by her religious zeal and exhortations became so conspicuous that many considered her "crazy" and "mentally unsound". Though she had preached for some time from the pulpits of the Free Baptist Church, she was not regularly ordained until 1868, being the first woman ordained in that conference. The denomination espoused more egalitarian views than others of the time, which matched well with Janes' convictions regarding social reform. She opposed prescriptive gender beliefs regarding limitations on educational opportunities to girls. At a young age, she embraced women's suffrage and wrote columns on the topic for seventeen weekly papers. She was actively engaged in temperance work.

Martha "Jane" Waldron was born in Northfield, Michigan, June 9, 1832. Her father, Leonard T. Waldron, was a native of Massachusetts. In 1830, he went to Michigan, bought a farm, married and became a successful farmer. He was an enthusiastic advocate of the free school movement and worked and voted for it, after he had paid for his own children's education. His ancestors came from Holland and settled in New Holland, now Harlem, New York, in 1816. Her mother, Nancy Bennett, was a gentle woman and a good housewife. She was a native of New York City.

Janes was the oldest of seven children. Her opportunities for knowledge were limited by the impossibility of obtaining it in that new region, but all her powers were used in the effort to gain it. All her school advantages were secured by doing housework at US$1 a week and saving the money to pay her tuition in a select school for one term. At the age of thirteen, she was converted and joined the Free Baptist Church. She took part in public meetings, praying and exhorting, because she felt that she must. Because, at that time, a woman's voice had not been heard in the frontier churches, she earned the reputation of being crazy.

On October 12, 1852, she married John Allen Sober, a young minister, fully cognizant of the times in the many reforms that agitated the public. He died November 19, 1864, leaving her with two children, Evangeline "Eva" (b. 1853) and Arthur, the older, eleven years old and the younger, four. She was in poor health.

The conviction that she ought to preach the gospel dated almost to the time of her conversion. Her duty and ability to enter that untried and forbidden field were long recognized by the church and conference to which she belonged, and she was encouraged to do what the church felt was her duty. In 1860, after much thought, she began to preach, and her work in the pulpit was considered successful. On May 23, 1867, she remarried. Her second husband was Rev. Henry H. Janes (1818–1886). They had one child, a son, Charles Wesley Janes (1862–1926).

In June, 1868, she was ordained, being the first woman ordained in the Free Baptist Church conference. She administered all the rites of the church except immersion, which she has never felt called to do. She had the care of a church as its pastor on several occasions, and traveled extensively under the auspices of the conference as evangelist. By 1880, Janes and her husband had separated; she followed Eva to Clay County, Iowa, and he followed a daughter from an earlier relationship. He died in 1886.

Janes became district superintendent of franchise of the Woman's Suffrage Association, during which time she edited a suffrage column in seventeen weekly papers. She also held meetings in the interest of that reform. Her temperance work dates back to 1879. She was county president of Clay County, Iowa, and organized every township in that county.