Get ready for a rare glimpse this week into Langley’s distaff history.

With Island County poised to seat its first all-women commission next month, it’s a great time to revisit Langley’s first matriarchal town government in the early 1920s — and just in time to salute the 100th anniversary of women’s right to vote in Washington state, Bob Waterman said.

“I think they showed that women could function well in town administration, much to the delight of women in the town, and to the surprise of some men who weren’t sure whether it would work or not,” said Waterman, chairman of the Langley Historic Preservation Commission and president of the South Whidbey Historical Society.

Waterman, himself a Langley city councilman, will present the program “When Women Ran Langley,” the story of Mayor Helen Coe and the all-women town council that guided the Village by the Sea from 1920-22.

The free program, sponsored by the Historic Preservation Commission and the historical society, will be at 7 p.m. Thursday, Dec. 9 in Fellowship Hall of Langley United Methodist Church at Third Street and Anthes Avenue. Donations are welcome.

Besides Coe, the 1920 six-member town administration included Grace English, Emma Mondon, Clara Brown, Lillian Wylie and Maggie McLeod. They and the women who succeeded a couple of them governed Langley between 1920-22, the only period before or since that the town was run entirely by women.

They also governed Langley during the adventurous early Prohibition years, and they were determined to clean up the town, morally and literally.

The women took office eight months before the ratification of the 19th amendment to the United States Constitution, which granted women the right to vote.

They began to lead Langley in January 1920 during a rough and tumble period in the town’s history, when animals roamed the rutted streets, sidewalks were in disrepair and piles of weeds and garbage were common.

“They faced many challenges,” Waterman said, “not the least of which was the attitude of some of the town’s male population.”

“So they had clean-up days,” he added. “They required the town marshal to tell people to clean up their messes, or the town would do it and charge them.”

Waterman elaborated in an e-mail: “Animal and other license fees were reinstated and collected. Animals running free on the streets were captured, and fines had to be paid to retrieve them. Manure piles and weeds were ordered removed and street repairs were initiated. A map was created to help define property lines.”

It also was a period during which beer and liquor were plentiful, even though there had been a statewide ban on liquor sales and manufacturing since 1916, four years before the 18th Amendment ushered in Prohibition, which lasted from 1920-33.

“Both men and women frequented the local watering holes,” Waterman said. “Billiard and card parlors on First Street did a booming business, and gaming and partying went on around the clock.”

Before getting into politics, Coe had founded the Ladies’ Civic Improvement Club in 1916, and the other councilwomen were members. They also belonged to the local chapter of the Woman’s Christian Temperance Union.

The women set about trying to deal with the town’s morals, Waterman said.

They enforced ordinances prohibiting dancing from 6 a.m. to midnight on Sundays, and closed all public dances, billiard and pool parlors, card parties and other amusements by 2 a.m. on weekdays and 1 a.m. on Saturdays.

“The stress of enforcing the ordinances passed by the ladies resulted in a rapid turnover of town marshals,” Waterman said, “four in 1920 alone.”

He said dealing with illegal alcohol manufacturing and consumption became a special focus of the council. Whidbey and Camano islands at the time were notorious bases for rumrunners from Canada, and alcohol was readily available in town.

“Prohibition set off a whole industry of homemade moonshine,” Waterman said. “There were lots of stills on the island.”

“Alcoholism was a big problem in Langley in 1920,” he added. “It was one of the things the women were anxious to do something about.”

There were no “taverns” in town during this period, Waterman said; they were known as “confectionaries,” but they were still places where liquor could be had. There was the Sea Breeze Confectionary near the marina; the Dog House Tavern on First Street was known as Howard’s Confectionary.

Langley’s councilwomen were a diverse lot with common goals, Waterman said.

• Coe, trained as a kindergarten teacher, came to Langley in 1896. She resigned as mayor in 1922 to push for a public library, which was finally established in 1923 with Coe as the first librarian.

• English came to Langley with her family around 1903. Her husband Henry became Langley’s second mayor in 1915. They had four children.

• Wylie came to the Village by the Sea in 1913 with her husband and three children and settled in a house on Edgecliff Drive. She donated her barn as a holding area for stray animals picked up in town and kept until their fines were paid.

She later turned her home into a “hospital-birthing house,” and although she had no formal nurse’s training, she was credited with saving lives during the 1918-19 influenza epidemic.

Her house was recently placed on Langley’s Register of Historic Places.

• Monson, her husband and six children came to Langley around 1903. Her husband, Leander, committed suicide in 1908, and her eldest son, Ernest, died from an accidental gunshot wound in 1910.

She served on the council for a year before resigning, and was replaced first by Mary Kohlwes, who in turn was replaced by Ethyl Manley in 1921. Monson’s daughter Elvira was town clerk during the first female administration.

• McLeod was appointed to the council in 1920, and took over as mayor when Coe resigned in 1922. She was mayor in 1922 when the town purchased its first fire engine, a modified Ford with two chemical tanks.

• Brown, who also lived on Edgecliff Drive, was appointed to the council in 1920 to replace a male member who had resigned, and she served until 1922.

In all, Langley’s all-women town council moved the fledgling community in a positive direction, Waterman said.

“They set the tone for subsequent administrations in making Langley a better and more beautiful place,” he said. “They had a sense of civic pride that has carried on.”