A Mother’s Day Tribute to Wyoming’s Nellie Tayloe Ross
A mother's work is never done. Especially for the incredible working women who juggle the demands of raising a family and paying the bills.
Here's a Mother's Day tribute to one of the hardest working moms in Wyoming history, Nellie Tayloe Ross.
Who Was Nellie Tayloe Ross?
Historians remember Ross as the first woman to ever serve as a United States Governor. She was also the mother of four sons, George, James, Alfred, and William.
Following the death of her husband, Wyoming Governor William Ross, in 1924, she was elected to replace him in a special election.
Imagine how difficult it must have been to grieve a husband, raise four children and carry the weight of the women's suffrage movement on your shoulders.
By all accounts, she handled it with grace and dignity.
Following her term as Wyoming's first, and only, female Governor, Ross later became the first woman to ever serve as Director of the United States Mint.
She made her last trip home to Cheyenne at the age of 96. Five years later, in 1977, Ross passed away in Washington, D.C. at the age of 101. She was laid to rest alongside her late husband at the Lakeview Cemetery in Cheyenne.