Skip to content

The University of Iowa Libraries

Skip to content
Go to
InfoHawk+
University of Iowa Libraries University of Iowa Libraries The University of Iowa The University of Iowa Libraries

News from the Archives

Tag: Rymph

Oct 06 2017

25 for 25: Mary Louise Smith

Posted on October 6, 2017October 6, 2017 by Anna Holland
Smith speaking at Republican Women’s Conference, 1968.

Today, at the Iowa Women’s Archives commemorate one of our founders, Mary Louise Smith! Smith was born Mary Louise Epperson on October 6th, 1914 in Eddyville, Iowa. She became involved with the Republican Party in the 1950s and quickly rose through the ranks. In 1974, just after Watergate, she was appointed as the first woman to lead the Republican National Committee. Among her many accomplishments, we’re most grateful for Smith’s part in establishing the Iowa Women’s Archives. Her papers, documenting a long political career, were among the first on IWA’s shelves.

Catherine Rymph was one of the first student hired to work in the Iowa Women’s Archives when it was established in 1992. Rymph earned her PhD in history at the University of Iowa in 1998 and is now a professor of history and director of undergraduate studies at the University of Missouri.  Her experience processing the papers of Mary Louise Smith had a profound impact on her:

The Mary Louise Smith papers and the Iowa Women’s Archives changed my life!—or at least they changed my career.

Catherine Rymph, professor of history, University of Missouri

In the summer of 1992, while a graduate student in History at the University of Iowa, I took an extra job working at the IWA (before the archive even opened).  I spent the next year and a half processing collections what at the time were the nearly empty stacks.  By far the largest collection I worked on was the papers of Mary Louise Smith, one of the IWA’s prescient founders.  The collection is rich in correspondence and other documentation of Smith’s many years as a Republican Party official and as an active participant in the 1970s women’s movement. Through the process of sorting through and organizing Smith’s papers, I became

Rymph’s book Republican Women: Feminism and Conservatism from Suffrage through the Rise of the New Right

particularly fascinated by her self-identification as a Republican feminist. So fascinated, in fact, that I switched my Ph.D. research focus from the 19th to 20th centuries and wrote a dissertation on women in the Republican Party.  I later published Republican Women: Feminism and Conservatism from Suffrage through the Rise of the New Right (University of North Carolina Press, 2006), which was the basis of my early career as a historian. Although I visited a number of other archives for my research, I never would have landed on the topic at all without that formative experience in Smith’s papers.

— Catherine Rymph, University of Missouri, 2017

This post is a part of the Iowa Women’s Archives’ 25th anniversary exhibit: 25 Collections for 25 Years: Selections from the Iowa Women’s Archives on display until December 29th at the Main Library Gallery. Gallery hours are available on the Main Library website. 

 

 

Posted in 25th Anniversary, Exhibits, From the collections, IWA History, ScholarshipTagged 25th anniversary, exhibit, founders, mary louise smith, myiwa, Rymph

Categories

  • 20th Anniversary
  • 25th Anniversary
  • African American Women in Iowa
  • Events
  • Exhibits
  • From the collections
  • In the news
  • IWA History
  • IWA Update
  • Jewish Women in Iowa
  • Kerber Travel Grant
  • Mujeres Latinas
  • People
  • Scholarship
  • Uncategorized
  • Women's History Month
  • Women's Sports

Archives

Meta

  • Log in
  • Entries feed
  • Comments feed
  • WordPress.org

More links

  • IWA news via email
  • More UI Librariea news

  • Donate to the IWA
  • Like us on Facebook
Proudly powered by WordPress | Theme: Zoia by Automattic.
University of Iowa Libraries University of Iowa Libraries The University of Iowa The University of Iowa Libraries
  • Contact the Libraries
  • Library locations & hours
  • News & Events
  • Help using the Libraries
  • Assistance for people with disabilities
  • Our diversity statement
  • Thank a Librarian
  • Web site/page feedback OR general suggestions
  • UI Libraries other links UI Libraries in the Internet Archive Use and reuse of UI Libraries web content - Creative Commons Staff SharePoint (authentication required)
  • UI Libraries on social media UI Libraries on Instagram UI Libraries on Facebook UI Libraries on Twitter UI Libraries on Pinterest UI Libraries on Tumblr UI Libraries on YouTube UI Libraries on Flickr UI Libraries blogs
  • 100 Main Library (LIB)
  • 125 West Washington St.
  • Iowa City, IA 52242-1420
  • 319-335-5299 (Service Desk)
  • ©2019 The University of Iowa
  • Give a gift to the Libraries!