History of Iowa From the Earliest Times to the Beginning of the Twentieth Century/4/Mary B. Welch

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MRS. MARY B. WELCH


MARY BEAUMONT WELCH, a native of the State of New York, was born at Lyons, in Wayne County, on the 3d of July, 1841. She received an education at Elmira Seminary and for several years was a teacher. Her first husband was George E. Dudley to whom she was married in 1858. After his death she married A. S. Welch of Michigan in 1868. She came with him to Iowa upon his election as president of the State Agricultural College, and at once became his most faithful and efficient helper in the varied duties devolving upon him in the organization of the new college. Her influence with the girls was unbounded from the beginning. As the first professor and organizer of the new department of Domestic Economy, she carried on a work that required a high order of inventive and executive ability and filled the position with such marked success as to win for it a high place in the experimental college achievements. She was frequently called upon for lectures in the line of her work and helped to elevate that branch of home accomplishments in public estimation. She aroused among her students much of her own enthusiasm over home making and all improved methods of conducting household affairs on a higher plane. Mrs. Welch was an ardent advocate of equal suffrage and was one of the officers of the State Association. After the death of President Welch she removed to California.