Category: Iowa Women's Hall of Fame

Bonnie J. Campbell
Bonnie J. Campbell


Bonnie J. Campbell is a former Iowa attorney general and a former official in the U.S. Department of Justice. Campbell was born on April 9, 1948, in Norwich, New York, and grew up in upstate New York. After graduating from high school, she moved to Washington, D.C, and worked as a clerk-stenographer for several politicians from 1965 to 1967, then as a clerk for the U.S. Senate Subcommittee on Intergovernmental Relations from 1967 to 1969. From 1969 to 1974, she was a caseworker in the office of U.S. Senator Harold […]
Carrie Chapman Catt
Carrie Chapman Catt


Carrie Lane Chapman Catt—an Iowa State University alumna who devoted most of her life to the expansion of women's rights around the world as well as international peace—is recognized as one of the key leaders of the American women's suffrage movement. Her superb oratory and organizational skills led to ratification of the 19th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution granting women the right to vote in August 1920. Catt was born on January 9, 1859, in Ripon, Wis., the second of three children of Lucius and Maria (Clinton) Lane. In 1866, […]
Mary Jane Coggeshall
Mary Jane Coggeshall


Mary Jane Coggeshall (January 17, 1836 - December 22, 1911) of Des Moines, Iowa, was dubbed "the mother of woman suffrage in Iowa" by leading suffragist and fellow Iowan Carrie Chapman Catt. Coggeshall was born in Indiana and moved to Des Moines in 1865 with her husband and children. In 1870, she was a charter member of both the Polk County Woman Suffrage Society and the Iowa Women Suffrage Association. She served as the IWSA president in 1890, 1891 and 1903-1905, and then as honorary president from 1905-1911. She also […]
Nancy Dunkel
Nancy A Dunkel


Nancy A. Dunkel was a member of the Iowa House of Representatives, representing District 57 from 2013 to 2017. Dunkel was the first woman to chair the Iowa Bankers Association. Dunkel, of Dyersville, Iowa, is a respected leader in the banking industry and an inspirational role model for women in business. She has held many positions in bank leadership roles, including majority shareholder and the president of a bank holding company. She has been a dedicated advocate of the banking industry and a mentor for other women to be successful […]
Joni Ernst
Joni Ernst


Joni Ernst assumed office in the U.S. Senate in 2015, the first woman from Iowa elected to either house of Congress. Ernst is also the Senate's first female combat veteran. Ernst was born on July 1, 1970 in Montgomery County, Iowa. She earned a bachelor's degree in psychology from Iowa State University and has a master's degree in justice administration from Columbus College. Ernst served a combined 21 years with the United States Army Reserve and the Iowa Army National Guard. From 2003 to 2004, she served as a company […]
Patty Judge
Patty Judge


Patty Judge served as Iowa's lieutenant governor from 2007 to 2011. She was the 2016 Democratic nominee for U.S. Senate from Iowa, but lost to incumbent Senator Charles Grassley. Judge was born November 2, 1943, in Fort Madison, Iowa. She earned her Registered Nursing degree from Iowa Methodist School of Nursing; she also attended the University of Iowa. She earned her real estate broker's license and set up a small business specializing in selling and appraising farms. In the 1980’s, she served as a mediator for the Iowa Farmer Creditor […]
Linda Kerber
Linda K Kerber


Preeminent among historians of her generation, Dr. Linda K. Kerber has devoted her life and career to the empowerment of women through a better understanding of women's history. The first professor of women's history at the University of Iowa in 1971, she became a catalyst for transforming the way scholars and students look at the contributions of women to society. As a humanist scholar, Kerber is an authority on American history and women's studies, achieving international distinction for her contributions to our understanding of gender, citizenship, and the legal and […]
Mary Kramer
Mary E Kramer


Mary E. Kramer served as U.S. ambassador to Barbados and the Eastern Caribbean from 2004 to 2006. Prior to serving as ambassador, Kramer served in the Iowa state Senate from 1990 to 2003. She was elected president of the Senate in 1997, becoming the first independently elected woman to fill the post. Kramer was born June 14, 1935, in Burlington, Iowa, and grew up in Iowa City. She holds a Bachelor of Arts in piano performance and a Master of Arts in lifelong learning, both from the University of Iowa. […]
Adeline Lavonne McCormick-Ohnemus
Adeline Lavonne McCormick-Ohnemus


Dr. Adeline Lavonne McCormick-Ohnemus, an advocate for healthy lifestyle choices and preventative medicine, was a role model and motivator for the rural women she cared for over the 45 years she lived and practiced medicine in Milo, Iowa. McCormick-Ohnemus was born on November 21, 1921, in Lucas County, Iowa. She put herself through junior college and became a teacher. She then decided to go to Drake University in pre-med and was the only woman in her class at Still College of Osteopathy (now Des Moines University) in the 1940s. Through […]
Jacqueline McGhee
Jacqueline E McGhee


Jacqueline Easley McGhee, a native of Des Moines, is a model of leadership and service. Whether serving in the capacity of corporate executive, civic leader, or elected representative, McGhee is committed to making Iowa a better place for all, particularly for women and minorities. McGhee was elected to the Des Moines School Board in 1990 and was the first African-American female to hold such a post. In 1994, she was elected by her fellow board members as president. McGhee has been appointed to serve on the national diversity committee of […]