Janette Stevenson Murray: Iowa Time Machine October 28, 1874

Iowa Time Machine ⏰:  On October 28, 1874, Janette Stevenson Murray was born in Traer. The pioneering educator, suffragist, author, and activist even won “Mother of the Year” from the American Mothers’ Committee of the Golden Rule Foundation. A glass-ceiling-shattering Iowa woman, Murray embodied the changing societal role of women during her lifetime.

The daughter of Scottish immigrants who settled in rural Tama County, Stevenson spent her early years in Iowa country schools before graduating from Traer High School in the late 1890s. In 1896, she graduated from Coe College in Cedar Rapids and headed west to teach for a few years in South Dakota and Nebraska before rising to the role of principal.

After leaving teaching to pursue graduate studies at the University of Chicago, Stevenson returned to Iowa and married Dr. Frederick Gray Murray. Both Kohawks and the Murrays produced five children who all went on to graduate from Coe. While raising a family, Janette Lindsay Stevenson began campaigning for suffrage. She also held significant roles at the State University of Iowa’s Child Welfare Research Station and the Parent Teacher Association.

An avid and talented writer, Janette Stevenson Murray wrote consistently throughout her lifetime. A columnist for the Cedar Rapids Gazette, she also wrote many important pieces distributed at the regional and national levels. With her husband, Stevenson Murray authored several books, including “The Story of Cedar Rapids,” “Jennie Iowa Berry and the First-Seventy-five Years of Women’s Organizations,” “They Came to Tama: An Authentic Story of Two Families from Scotland Who Pioneered in Iowa,” as well as others. #Iowa #History #OTD #Author #Advocate