C. Louise Boehringer

1) C. Louise Boheringer, 2) Mattie L. Williams, 3) Maie Bartlett Heard, 4) Margaret Wheeler Ross, 5) Edith O. Kitt

Cora Louise Boehringer (1878 – September 11, 1956) was the first female Superintendent of Schools, Yuma County and the first female to be elected to office in Arizona. In 2008 she was inducted in the Arizona Women's Hall of Fame. She has been called "the mother of the Arizona educational system".

Early life

Cora Louise Boehringer was born in Morrison, Illinois, the daughter of Jacob F. Boehringer and Louise Greenawald, immigrants from Germany.

Boehringer attended primary school in St. Louis, Missouri and then high school in DeBalk Normal School, in DeKalb, Illinois, graduating in 1902, and then attended teacher colleges in both Illinois and Missouri. She studied and secured degrees from Columbia University (B.S. in education, 1911), Columbia Teacher's College (professional certification in elementary supervision, 1911) and California State University at Berkeley (M.A. in education, 1930).

Career

C. Louise Boehringer held several positions as instructor in Illinois and Missouri: director of Normal Department, Illinois Normal School, Geneseo, Illinois; director of State Normal school, Cape Girardeau, Missouri; faculty member, University of Missouri (1904); organizer, Mississippi Normal School (1907); superintendent, Training School for Teachers, Springfield, Illinois (1912). In this period she wrote for the Missouri State Courses of Study for Rural and Village Schools.

While in the Midwest, Boehringer partecipated in the Women's suffrage movement.

In 1913 Boehringer was elected County Superintendent of Schools in Yuma, Arizona, the first woman to hold such an elective office in Arizona, a position she held until 1917. She became President of the Arizona Council of Administrative Women in Education, a federation of female education workers, like high school department principals and heads, and county school superintendents.

In 1916, 1922 and 1940, Boehringer ran for State Superintendent of Public Instruction, but was unsuccessful: the school superintendent was on the state Parole and Pardons Board and the majority of voters was not comfortable with the idea that women could decide on the fate of criminals.

In 1917 Boehringer attended University of Illinois at Urbana–Champaign to follow journalism courses and became an Educational journalist. She then bought the Arizona Teacher Magazine and became its editor until 1939 when she turned ownership of the magazine to the Arizona Education Association. She was editor of the Arizona Patent-Teacher Bulletin, the National Altrusian, and the Arizona Geography, and a free-lance writer on education and pioneer women. She was Vice-President for Arizona National League of American Pen Women, of which she organized the Arizona branches in Phoenix and Tucson. She contributed to Women in the Southwest and Biographies in Arizona Historical Review. She was chairman of educational broadcasts for the Arizona Department of Public Instruction.

In 1920 Boehringer was elected for two sessions to the State legislature (United States) and Chairman of Committee on Education, establishing the State School Board, the first per capita ($25 per schoolchild) funding of schools, and the legitimization of children born out of wedlock. In 1933 she was appointed director of curriculum for the Department of Education, a position she held for six years. In 1934 she was appointed president of the Arizona Parent-Teacher Association.

In 1926 Boehringer was legislative chairmain for the Arizona Federation of Women's Clubs. She was President (for Arizona) of Business and Professional Women's Clubs: being a pioneer member since it was founded in 1919 in St. Louis, she was elected first president of the Arizona branch in 1921, re-elected in 1924. In both positions she helped working women to network and advocated for equal pay and education.

Boehringer was involved in many other organizations:

• Professor at Northern Arizona University, summer classes.
• State Chairman of Better Homes in America, appointed in 1928 by Herbert Hoover.
• Member of American Association of University Women.
• Member of National Education Association (N.E.A.), in 1913 she spoke at their convention in San Francisco.
• Founder of the State Council of Administrative Women in Education in 1915.
• Chairman of the College Woman's Drive for Food Conservation, Arizona, in 1917.
• Secretary of the Arizona State Teacher's Association, 1919.
• Member of Altrusa International, Inc.
• Member of Delta Kappa Gamma
• Member of the Women's Suffrage League

Personal life

In 1912 C. Louise Boehringer moved to Yuma, Arizona, joining her brother, George, and parents who moved there in 1909, claiming a 40-acre ranch and establishing a dairy farm.

When in 1940 Boehringer lost for the third time in the run for State Superintendent of Public Instruction, she retired from public life and in 1953 she moved to Washington (state) with her sister-in-law.

She died in Seattle on September 11, 1956, and is buried at Evergreen Washelli Memorial Park, Seattle.