This engaging study of women in early Texas fills an important gap in the history of the state. First published by John Jenkins in 1975 and long out of print, Women in Early Texas is now available again with a new scholarly introduction by award-winning Texas historian Debbie Cottrell. The volume contains biographies of fifty notable women, representing a wide variety of ethnic groups and classes, whose lives deeply influenced the way Texas developed. Many of the biographies were written by descendants of the women and have been extensively researched and supplemented by heretofore unused...

"In 1918 Annie Webb Blanton broke the gender barrier in Texas politics when she was elected to head the state's public school system. This victory came despite the fact that women in Texas could not vote in the general election that elevated her to office." Debbie Mauldin Cottrell thus begins the story of a pioneering woman educator, a story of accomplishments on behalf of education and of women that includes years of teaching in public school and university classrooms, the first female presidency of the Texas State Teachers Association, and the founding of an international sorority for...