After the 19th Amendment passed (but before it was ratified) in 1919, giving women the right to vote, a group of women in New York formed The Confederation of Zonta Clubs.
The Zonta Club would eventually become Zonta International and is a service organization for women in much that same way that Kiwanis and Rotary were service organizations for men at the time of Zonta’s founding.
Dorothy Loudon organized Rochester’s branch of the club in 1965 and its first major project was the purchase of a bus for the Ability Building Center in 1966.
Over the next several years, they would work with ABC on a number of other projects, including a new kitchen and dining room for the ABC employees.
The new space, named the Zonta Cafeteria, was highlighted in a dinner sponsored by the Zonta Club in honor of the women who worked at ABC.
Elizabeth Lowry, member of the founding board of ABC, is shown at left here with Helen Douglass Kimmel, then president of the Zonta Club. This is just one photo at the History Center of Olmsted County archive.