orig. Carrie Lane
born Jan. 9, 1859, Ripon, Wis., U.S.
died March 9, 1947, New Rochelle, N.Y.
U.S. advocate of woman suffrage.
A graduate of Iowa State College (1880), she became a high-school principal in Mason City, Iowa, in 1881 and superintendent of schools two years later; she was one of the first U.S. women to hold such a post. She married Leo Chapman in 1884. After his untimely death in 1886 she devoted herself to organizing the Iowa Woman Suffrage Association (1887–90). Her marriage to George W. Catt, an engineer, in 1890, was unusual in its prenuptial legal contract providing her with four months of free time each year to work exclusively for woman suffrage. In 1900 she was elected to succeed woman suffrage movement.
Carrie Chapman Catt.
By courtesy of the League of Women Voters of Illinois