News & Updates

Rosalie Wahl In the 1970s, DFL women began to organize and work for more women to be appointed in government. They set their sights on getting a woman appointed to the Minnesota Supreme Court. This would allow them to last beyond the current governor. Rosalie Wahl (1924-2013) was the first…

PRISM Campus Alliance from St. Paul College marched in the Minneapolis Pride parade in June 2019. Minneapolis Star-Tribune file, Nicole Neri. In 1989, Governor Rudy Perpich proposed a state commission to study adding sexual orientation to the proposed Human Rights Act, which did not pass. Governor Arne Carlson issued an…

Katie McWatt Kathleen Curry McWatt Born in 1931, Kathleen Curry McWatt (1931-2010) grew up in Minneapolis. As a first grader, and the only African American child in her school, she was followed home by a group of white children who threatened to lynch her. With the support of her parents…

Mabeth Hurd Paige Minnesota did not elect another woman to Congress until Betty McCollum was elected from the fourth district in 2000. She began her political journey when she was elected to the North St. Paul City Council in 1986. In 1992, she was elected to the Minnesota House of Representatives with…

Anna Dickie Olesen Anna Dickie Olesen In 1922, Anna Dickie Olesen (1885-1961) ran for the US Senate as a Democrat from Minnesota. She was the first woman in the United States to run for Senate as the endorsed candidate of a major party. Her opponents were Republican incumbent Frank Kellogg…

Myrtle Cain In 1922, women were able to run for office. In 1923, four women reached the Minnesota State Legislature. After this success, however, few women followed in their footsteps. Numbers did not increase significantly until the 1980s. The 2019-2020 legislature includes sixty-four women, down from a peak of seventy-one…