About

Welcome! This site is a celebration of Iowa women in politics. It will be regularly updated with new content.

Check out Voices to hear the experience of Iowa women politicians in their own words. This section features video interviews with current and retired politicians discussing their experiences in elected office, as well as tribute video essays memorializing women who served.

See Iowa Politicians for a complete list of Iowa women who have served in statewide and federal elected office, as well as visualizations of their representation over time and across the state.

Learn more about the history of women’s suffrage and their involvement in Iowa politics in The Women’s Movement, an exhibit written by Pam Stek and featuring documents and materials from the Iowa Women’s Archive.

Project Background

This project grew out of the work of 50-50 in 2020, which was a nonpartisan organization founded in 2010 by two former state senators, Maggie Tinsman, a Republican from Scott County, and Jean Lloyd-Jones, a Democrat from Johnson County.   Their goal was to recruit, train and mentor women of both political parties, so that by the year 2020, women would hold 50% of the seats in the Iowa Legislature.   When they realized that Iowa was one of two states that had never elected a woman to the U.S. Congress nor to the office of governor, they expanded their mission to include those goals as well.

50-50 in 2020’s intensive, decade-long plan of work was designed to culminate in the 100^th anniversary of the 19th amendment and women’s suffrage in 2020. On January 31 of that year, the organization filed Articles of Dissolution with Iowa’s Secretary of State.   Not all of the goals had been reached, but great progress had been made:  women held the governor’s office, one U.S. Senate seat and two U.S. Representative seats, and the number of women in the Iowa Legislature had increased from 23% to 30%.

In coalition with other groups, 50-50 in 2020 also organized a number of events to commemorate the centennial and share stories of women’s political achievements with people across the state of Iowa. As a part of this commemorative work, Jean Lloyd-Jones spearheaded the development of an oral history project documenting the experiences of women like herself who had served in the Iowa legislature. In 2018, Jean began discussing this idea with John Culshaw, Director of the University of Iowa Libraries. Those conversations culminated in the creation of this website, a collaboration between the University of Iowa Libraries and 50-50 in 2020, which features excerpts from the interviews with legislators conducted by Jean and her fellow members of the 50/50 in 2020 board, as well as data visualization tools and an online exhibit celebrating the history of women in politics.

While 50-50 in 2020 is now longer active, its work continues through organizations like the American Association of University Women (AAUW), the League of Women Voters, and other groups that utilize the training programs 50-50 in 2020 developed.  A new entity, 50-50 in Iowa, will sponsor student organizations dedicated to supporting women in politics in Iowa’s institutions of higher learning.   Just as with the fight for suffrage, tactics will change and timelines must be extended if political equity is to be achieved. 

You can learn more about the founding, mission, and evolution of 50-50 in 2020 by watching this video history interview with Jean Lloyd-Jones and Maggie Tinsman, interviewed by Elaine Kresse. This video was produced by the AAUW, with videography arrangements and editing by AAUW member Susan Wakefield. 

Thanks and Acknowledgements

This project has been a collaborative effort by many people, and we thank them all for their invaluable contributions.

Learn more

Interested in learning more about the history of women in politics?

Hard Won, Not Done: A Century’s Struggle is an exhibit presented by the Old Capitol Museum in partnership with the League of Women Voters to commemorate the 100th Anniversary of women’s suffrage. It features suffragist history and artifacts, examines themes of intersectionality, movement fragmentation, achievements, and delays, and highlights some movement heroes with a call from the past to use your vote today.”

The Women’s Suffrage in Iowa Scrapbook was first created to honor the 90th Anniversary of women’s suffrage, and updated in 2020. The Iowa Women’s Archives (IWA) received a grant from the State Historical Society, Inc. to digitize documents, photographs, and artifacts highlighting Iowa’s unique heritage, and created this exhibit to provide a brief introduction to Iowa’s suffrage history.