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Utah Jazz owner and billionaire Gail Miller among Utah’s influential Women of the Century

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Evaluating Utah’s place in the 100-year history since the 19th Amendment granted the right to vote to women across the U.S. requires taking a step backward – after all, many women in Utah feel as if they got a 50-year head start.

In January 1870, on a snowy night in Salt Lake City, about 5,000 women squeezed into a church building and held an “Indignation Meeting.” No men were allowed in – with the notable exception of journalists – and the women determined they would ask the territorial legislature of Utah for the vote.

As with many meetings in those early days of the Utah territory, the discussion was colored by religion and politics. News that lawmakers in Washington, D.C., were considering a tough new law to combat polygamy, the women, members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, met to prove that they were not victims and that they were not powerless. Not all were living in polygamous marriages, but they were unanimous in their determination to assert their rights to freedom of religion.

A few weeks later, on Feb. 14, Seraph Young became the first American woman to vote under an equal suffrage law, casting her ballot in a municipal election.

The events of 1870 set the stage for women in Utah to take on the suffrage cause in their unique way, marking inspiring victories and enduring heartbreaking setbacks but always embodying that same pioneering spirit.

Now, a century and a half later, America is celebrating the 100th anniversary of the 19th Amendment this August. To mark the occasion, the USA TODAY Network is naming 10 American women from all 50 states, plus the District of Columbia, to recognize their contributions to their respective states and to the country as Women of the Century. The women were expected to have a documented track record showing outstanding achievement in areas such as arts and literature, business, civil rights, education, entertainment, law, media, nonprofits and philanthropy, politics, science and medicine, and sports.

Utah’s rich history of inspiring women started early and has only strengthened since. Picking just 10 people leaves out so much – so many dynamic figures, so many compelling moments, amazing achievements and powerful accomplishments completed in the face of seemingly insurmountable challenges.

Some of the state’s most notable names didn’t quite make it into the list of 10 or else didn’t quite qualify.

Hannah Kaaepa, an early advocate for Hawaiian women’s rights who joined leading Utah suffragists in speaking before the National Council of women, died in 1918, just two years before the 19th Amendment passed, making her ineligible.

It was a similar case with Fanny Brooks, the first Jewish woman to settle in Utah, whose discussions with early Latter-day Saints leader Brigham Young helped lead to better relations between Mormons and nonmembers. She died in 1901.

Others, like historian Helen Papanikolas, Shoshone tribal historian Mae Timbimboo Parry and Marie Cornwall, founder of the Marriott Library and retired director of the Women’s Research Institute at Brigham Young University, would have been worthy choices but did not, in the end, make the list of 10.

Those included here come from various generations and across the spectrum of categories, but all have been champions of that same pioneering spirit of those 5,000 women who gathered in Salt Lake City 150 years earlier.

Emmeline B. Wells

Journalist, editor, poet and women’s rights advocate

(1828-1921)

Emmeline B Wells
Photo: Library of Congress, Illustration: USA TODAY NETWORK

A journalist, editor, poet and women’s rights advocate who represented the state at both the National and American Women’s Suffrage conventions, Emmeline Wells was the state’s preeminent champion of suffrage during the Utah territory’s transition into statehood.

She was among the first women in the U.S. to vote in local elections, during the 1870 elections, and became an early advocate for suffrage and educational and economic opportunities for women. When Congress rescinded all Utah women's right to vote in 1887, Wells led the suffragists in a lobbying effort to ensure equal suffrage was included in the Constitution when Utah became a state in 1896.

She joined the National Council of Women in the United States and was the first woman from Utah to hold an office. The year before she died, Wells saw the dream of national women’s suffrage fulfilled when Congress passed the 19th Amendment.

Alberta Hill Henry

Civil rights and education advocate

(1920-2005)

Alberta Hill Henry
Photo: J. Willard Marriott Library, Special Collections, University of Utah, Illustration: USA TODAY Network

Born to sharecroppers in Louisiana, Alberta Henry moved to Utah in 1949 where she became one of the state's most prominent civil rights and education advocates.

Henry was president of the Salt Lake chapter of the NAACP and spent a lifetime fighting for causes ranging from housing to employment to education. 

In 1967, she established a foundation to help low income and minority students pay for college, worked as an aide in the city's Head Start program and later became a liaison between the school district and the Black community.

Over the course of her career she served on more than 100 boards and committees, including the Utah State Advisory Committee to the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights, and was awarded a commendation certificate from President Richard Nixon in 1970.

Terry Tempest Williams 

Author, environmentalist, naturalist and activist

(1955- )

Terry Tempest Williams
Douglas C. Pizac, Associated Press, Illustration: USA TODAY Network

Born in California but raised in the Salt Lake Valley, Terry Tempest Williams is an author, environmentalist, naturalist and advocate for freedom of speech and women's rights.

Williams has been a nationally influential voice on how environmental issues are social issues and ultimately matters of justice. In addition to several books, she has been published in a variety of environmental, feminist, political and literary magazines. 

She has testified before Congress on women’s health issues, and she and her husband tried to lease 1,120 acres of federal land in rural Utah to prevent the government from drilling for oil and gas, but her bid was rejected by the Bureau of Land Management's Utah branch. 

Among her honors are the Robert Marshall Award from the Wilderness Society, the Distinguished Achievement Award from the Western American Literature Association, and the Wallace Stegner Award from the Center for the American West.

Zitkála-Šá

Writer, musician, teacher and activist for Native people’s civil rights

(1876-1938)

Zitkála-Šá
National Portrait Gallery, Smithsonian Institution, Illustration: USA TODAY NETWORK

A leading advocate for Native people’s civil rights, Zitkála-Šá, meaning “Red Bird,” was born on the Yankton Sioux Reservation in 1876 in Dakota Territory and spent much of her adult life in Utah. A writer, musician, teacher and activist, she gained renown after delivering a speech on women’s inequality as a college student in 1895.

While attending Earlham College, she began recording Native American oral histories and translating them into English. An accomplished violinist, she wrote "The Sun Dance" with composer and music professor William Hanson, the first opera written by a Native American.

She published a book called “American Indian Stories” and founded the Indian Welfare Committee of the General Federation of Women’s Clubs.

She also advocated for civil rights for women and Native Americans, including the 1924 Indian Citizenship Act, which gave Native Americans the right to vote in the United States. While in Utah, Zitkála-Šá joined the Society of American Indians. Through her writings, she called for preservation of the Native way of life while lobbying for their right to full American citizenship.      

In 1926, she continued to lobby for Native suffrage rights through the National Council of American Indians, which Zitkála-Šá and her husband co-founded. She not only served as the council’s president, Zitkála-Šá was also a public speaker and major fundraiser until her death in 1938.

Martha Hughes Cannon

Doctor and suffragist

(1857-1932)

Martha Hughes Cannon
Used by permission, Utah State Historical Society, Illustration: USA TODAY Network

Martha Cannon, a doctor who was born in Wales, emigrated with her family to the U.S. and became a prominent worker for the women’s suffrage movement.

She earned her medical degree in 1880, a degree from the National School of Elocution and Oratory, and a degree in pharmaceuticals at the University of Pennsylvania in 1882.

Cannon set up a private medical practice in Salt Lake City and became the resident physician at the Deseret Hospital.

While working as a typesetter for the Woman’s Exponent, she became immersed in the women's rights movement. In 1895, she was the first woman in Salt Lake City to register to vote.

One of six wives to a prominent Mormon church leader, she beat her husband and fellow Women of the Century Emmeline B. Wells in an 1896 election to the state senate, becoming the first woman in U.S. history to serve in such a position. 

She continued to practice medicine while she served one four-year term and wrote several successful legislative bills that revolutionized public health and sanitation, regulated working conditions for women and girls, and spearheaded funding for the education of speech-and-hearing-impaired students.

Elizabeth “Lizzie” Taylor

Journalist and activist

(1874-1932)

Elizabeth Lizzie Taylor
Photo provided by Utah Womens History, preserved by Josephine Taylor Dickey, Amy Tanner Thiriot, Illustration: USATODAY NETWORK

Elizabeth "Lizzie" Austin Taylor, born in 1874 in Kansas to parents likely recently freed from slavery, was a journalist and activist. In July 1904, Taylor was among the earliest members of the Western Federation of Colored Women and spent her life fighting the economic, social, and family concerns plaguing Black women in America.

With the help of her husband, William Wesley Taylor, she started a newspaper, the Utah Plain Dealer, for the small Black community of the territory. The couple joined the Utah Press Association and the Western Negro Press Association, and Taylor served as president of the latter organization for several years.

She helped establish the Trinity African Methodist Episcopal church and a Calvary Baptist Church in Salt Lake City which still exist today and led children’s groups and participated in numerous other civic causes.

Olene S. Walker

Utah’s first female lieutenant governor

(1930-2015)

Olene S Walker
Douglas C. Pizac, Associated Press, Illustration: USA TODAY NETWORk

Olene Walker served eight years in the Utah Legislature, where she served a term as a majority whip and more than a decade as Utah's first female lieutenant governor. She went on to become Utah's first female governor in 2003 at age 72.

Walker ushered dozens of bills to passage including the one that helped establish Utah’s Rainy-Day Fund to protect state programs during times of economic downturn. Her foremost accomplishments included legislation promoting greater fairness in school board elections, improving health insurance for children and improving housing opportunities for low-income families.

When she left office in 2005, she was one of Utah’s most popular governors ever, having finished her term with an 87% approval rating. Walker continued to be active in community politics, and in 2012 she established the Walker Institute of Politics and Public Service to help foster students interest in political engagement and leadership in Utah. 

Gail Miller 

Philanthropist, Owner of the Utah Jazz

(1943- )

Gail Miller
Rick Bowmer, Associated Press, Illustration: USA TODAY NETWORK

Gail Miller is best known as a billionaire businesswoman who took over ownership of the Utah Jazz with the death of her husband, Larry H. Miller, in 2009, but she has become perhaps the state’s foremost philanthropist.

She and her husband began their business empire with the purchase of their first car dealership in 1979. Today the Larry H. Miller Group of Companies has swelled into a group of businesses that employ more than 10,000 people across the western United States.

She presides over the Larry H. Miller Education Foundation and the Larry H. & Gail Miller Family Foundation, which support a range of charitable, educational and humanitarian causes.

Miller is also the co-chair of Count My Vote, a group that seeks to increase Utah voter participation by modernizing that state's election system.

She has received a Doctor of Humane Letters from the University of Utah and Salt Lake Community College, an honorary Doctor of Humanities from Weber State University, “A Giant in Our City,” the Salt Lake Chamber’s highest award, and the ATHENA Award.

Donia Jessop

First woman elected mayor in Hildale, Utah

(1970- )

Donia Jessop
Rick Bowmer, Associated Press, Illustration: USA TODAY NETWORK

Donia Jessop is best known for being the first woman elected mayor in Hildale, Utah, the former home of Warren Jeffs and his polygamous sect. Jessop has led a push for modernization in “Short Creek,” pushing to bring in new infrastructure, recreational activities, an economic boost, and a revitalization of the community's rich history.

Jessop was born into the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and grew up in the church. Her uncle, Leroy Johnson, was church president until 1986. But things changed as Jeffs took over, and as his rules became more strict, members who questioned his leadership quickly found themselves jettisoned.

Jessop and her husband were excommunicated in 2012, shortly after Jeffs was convicted on two counts of sexual assault of a child and sentenced to life in prison.

She returned home a few years later and in 2017 started building a grassroots coalition of supporters for removing the FLDS from from government positions. She won her race for mayor, beating incumbent Phillip Barlow 129-81, and after a majority of city employees, almost all of whom were members of the FLDS, quit their jobs, she recruited new help and has led a dramatic change in working toward modernization.

Liz Owens

Women’s advocate and CEO of YWCA Utah

(1980- )

Liz Owens
Francisco Kjolset, The Salt Lake Tribune via AP, Illustration: USA TODAY NETWORK

The recently named CEO of the Young Women’s Christian Association, Liz Owens has been a strong advocate for women and women of color, serving on the board of directors at Planned Parenthood Association of Utah, Utah Pacific Islander Civic Engagement Coalition, and Journey of Hope, among others. Before moving to the YWCA, she worked as executive director of the Utah Coalition Against Sexual Assault, advocating for victims of domestic violence.

Owens has worked in various capacities as a community organizer, pushing at Utah’s boundaries of gender and racial justice, and in her new position she will be tasked with managing the nonprofit organization’s transitional housing and child care center, along with broader advocacy initiatives and lobbying to the Utah Legislature.

Owens previously worked as director for community engagement at Planned Parenthood Association of Utah and has held positions with Utah Pride Center and the Utah Domestic Violence Coalition.

She lived and worked in London from 2007 to 2011 and was the southern services manager for Women in Prison, an organization that serves women and girls affected by the criminal justice system.

Sources used in the Women of the Century list project include newspaper articles, state archives, historical websites, encyclopedias and other resources. 

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