ABSTRACT
Women of the middle and upper classes had been vocal opponents of billboards for some time before the proliferation of the automobile. Around the turn of the century they participated in a wide variety of municipal art societies, civic clubs, and village improvement associations. They also helped found national organizations such as the American League for Civic Improvement (ALCI) and were auxiliary members of the American Park and Outdoor Art Association (APOAA), both of which joined to form the American Civic Association (ACA) in 1904.1 Members of groups like these were determined to create cities that were “an education in beauty” and that bred “moral order” in children and new Americans. For them, leaving commercial enterprises such as billboard advertising unchecked was tantamount to condoning moral decline and urban disorder.2
