Augusta Jane Chapin

Augusta Jane Chapin (July 16, 1836 – June 30, 1905), was a Universalist minister, educator and activist for women's rights. She was born in Lakeville, New York, the eldest of eleven children, to Almon Morris Chapin and Jane Pease.

In December 1863 became one of the first women to be ordained as a minister. In 1893 Chapin was conferred a Doctor of Divinity degree by Lombard University; the first ever awarded to a woman in America. In 1893 she chaired the Woman's Committee of the World Parliament of Religions as part of the Chicago World's Fair. She was a charter member of the American Woman Suffrage Association.

Chapin served many congregations during her ministerial career: itinerancy in Michigan, 1859-63; Bennington, Michigan, 1864-67; Mount Pleasant, Iowa, 1868; Milwaukee, Wisconsin, 1869; Iowa City, Iowa, 1870-73; Allston, Massachusetts, 1874; San Francisco, California and Oregon, 1874; Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, 1875-76; Blue Island, Illinois, 1876-77; Chicago, Illinois, 1878; Aurora, Illinois, 1878-79; itinerancy in Michigan, 1880-83; Hillsdale, Michigan, 1884-85; Oak Park, Illinois, 1886-92; Omaha, Nebraska, 1894-95; and Mount Vernon, New York, 1897-1901.

References

* [http://www.uua.org/uuhs/duub/articles/augustajanechapin.html Dictionary of Unitarian and Universalist Biography]
* Cassara, Ernest. "Chapin, Augusta Jane" "Notable American Women." Vol. 1, 4th ed., The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 1975 (ISBN 978-0-674-62734-5)