Wives, and members, in one paragraph

The page that argues against the reading the March notice supports — and then half agrees with it.

Nine months earlier the same paper had written of “the lady-members of the Emblem club” and “the men members”, and called a meeting of all the lady-members at the club house. This archive treated that as its best evidence that women belonged to the club in their own right, and it still is. But an archive that only files the pages agreeing with it is not an archive, so here is the other one.

The first sentence is plainly the auxiliary reading: these women are at the club because their husbands are members. The third sentence then sorts the room into “the members” and “the guests” and puts Mrs. Charles W. Hayes among the members — of a party the paper has just described as the wives of the members.

So the Bulletin's usage is not consistent, and neither reading can be established from the words alone. What can be said is narrower and worth saying: within a single nine-month stretch the paper called the club's women lady-members, called them the wives of members, and called them the members, sometimes in the same paragraph. The question of when women joined and on what terms stays open, and this page is part of why.