Olympia Brown (January 5, 1835 – October 23, 1926) was a famous Women's suffragist.

She was born in Prairie Ronde, Michigan. She attended Mount Holyoke College (then called Mount Holyoke Female Seminary) from 1854-55 but found it too orthodox for her already progressive viewpoints. She then transferred to, and graduated from, Antioch College in 1860. In the late 1850's co-educational Antioch offered the same curriculum to men as women and Rebecca Pennell the first faculty member to receive equal pay to a man in the United States taught at Antioch. Still young activist Olympia Brown confronted sexism at Antioch. While men were expected to recite speeches from memory female students where told to read them from manuscripts. Brown made a point to read her speeches from memory and encouraged other female students to do likewise [1]. She was the first woman to graduate at a regularly established theological school (St. Lawrence University) in 1863. In that same year she also became the first woman to achieve full ministerial standing recognized by a denomination, as an ordained Universalist minister. In comparison, Antoinette Brown was ordained as a minister by a Congregationalist Church in 1853, but this was not recognized by her denomination[2]. Brown served as minister to congregations in Massachusetts, Connecticut and Wisconsin. In 1873 she married John Henry Willis.

Olympia Brown was a member of the Woman's Party and the Women's International League for Peace and Freedom. She was also the co-founder of the New England Woman Suffrage Association and the president of the Federal Suffrage Association

In 1999 she was inducted into the Michigan Women's Hall of Fame.

In 1878, the Rev. Olympia Brown came to Racine, Wis., and served as the minister of The Universalist Society of Racine until 1887, when she began traveling throughout Wisconsin and other states in the Midwest to promote women's sufferage. Under Olympia Brown's ministry, the church became a forum for the discussion of all social issues and the women members began to vote and hold offices in the church. She invited Julia Ward Howe, Elizabeth Cady Stanton, and Susan B. Anthony to air their views from the pulpit of this small church.

Soon after Rev. Brown's tenure, the congregation built a new building, which was dedicated in 1895 as the Church of the Good Shepherd. The building was enlarged a year later and still stands today at the corner of College Avenue and Seventh Street in downtown Racine. It now bears the name of the Olympia Brown Unitarian Universalist Church to the honor the Rev. Brown's ministry and life. An elementary school in Racine is also named after Rev. Brown.

See also

• First-wave feminism
• Ordination of women
• Antioch College

External links

• Biography
• Dictionary of Unitarian and Universalist Biography: Olympia Brown

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