The Woman's Club of Wisconsin is hosting a 150th anniversary celebration Thursday; its exact 150th anniversary falls on October 9, 2026. The nation's oldest continuously operating private women's club is marking the milestone with a concert built entirely around the kind of ambition that founded it: original music written by women and nonbinary composers. Three world premieres commissioned specifically for the anniversary will fill the club's Romanesque Revival hall at 813 E. Kilbourn Avenue, with cocktail hour starting at 5:30 p.m., a dinner buffet at 6 p.m., and the performance itself at 7:30 p.m.
The Woman's Club of Wisconsin traces its founding to October 1876, when a lecture in Milwaukee by suffragist Julia Ward Howe inspired its formation, according to Urban Milwaukee. That makes it the oldest continuously operating private women's club in the country, a distinction that has held for a century and a half. The club's own building has a milestone of its own: it was designed in 1887 by architect George Bowman Ferry. The cited National Park Service registration document concerns a different Wauwatosa property.
That same document credits club members with an even bolder feat a decade after the club's founding. In 1886, members established the Athenaeum stock company, offering 1,000 shares at $25 each; the goal was nearly met, with the remainder borrowed for their building — a venture recognized as the world's first public stock company organized by women. It's a detail that gives Thursday's concert extra resonance: a night built around new music by young women, staged inside a building literally financed by women who had to invent their own economic pathway to build it.
Three Emerging Composers, Three New Works
Present Music and alumnae of the Luna Composition Lab are presenting the concert, which includes the world premiere of three original works commissioned exclusively for the anniversary. Featured composer Olivia Bennett, a 2019–20 Luna Composition Lab Fellow and Rice University music composition graduate, has been an active composer for 14 years and has had her work performed internationally, including at Switzerland's Lucerne Festival, according to Luna Composition Lab.
Also on the bill is Zola Saadi-Klein, an Iranian-American composer and 2020–21 Luna Lab Fellow now attending Oberlin Conservatory. A third commissioned piece comes from Alex Temple, whose composition for the anniversary season was made possible through dedicated funding from patron Nora Finnigan Werra, honoring the Woman's Club of Wisconsin's milestone, according to Present Music. The program also includes Missy Mazzoli, who co-founded Luna Composition Lab and appears on the concert both as a composer and as one of the lab's founders.
A Convergence of Three Anniversaries
Present Music itself is marking a milestone this year: the ensemble is celebrating its 45th season in Milwaukee. Meanwhile, Luna Composition Lab — co-founded in 2016 by composers Missy Mazzoli and Ellen Reid to close the classical music gender gap by mentoring female, nonbinary, and gender-nonconforming composers ages 13 to 18 — is celebrating its 10th anniversary. Present Music has framed Thursday's concert as a deliberate convergence of all three milestones: the club's 150th year, the ensemble's 45th season, and the lab's 10th anniversary, per Present Music.
The Luna Lab anniversary is itself part of something bigger. The organization also lists Luna Composition Lab alumnae. Thursday's Milwaukee performance brings the work of Luna Lab alumnae to a live audience in Milwaukee.
Preservation Dollars Keep the Venue Standing
The 1887 clubhouse hosting Thursday's concert remains part of the club's historic setting. It's a reminder of the venue's historic status, even as it continues hosting the kind of civic and cultural programming that has defined the club since its founding.
Tickets and Details
General seating for Thursday's concert costs $35, while premier seating costs $55; the dinner buffet is a separate $65 add-on. The full evening runs from 5:30 p.m. to 9 p.m. at the Woman's Club of Wisconsin. Those with questions can reach the club by phone at (414) 276-5170 or by email at [email protected], and more information is available through the club's website.
