2009/04/21 by katherinea. s. sibley · 1 citation
Social Sciences · #Gender Diversity and Inequality #Gender, Security, and Conflict #International Labor and Employment Law
paper · doi:10.1111/j.1467-7709.2009.00787.x
openalex publication_date 2009/04/21 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/30
In 1922, Lucile Atcherson became the first woman hired as a foreign service officer in the United States. Despite her high exam score, President Warren G. Harding had to intervene to assure her placement in Paris. The opposition of the State Department was evident in the words of Joseph Grew, who noted that Atcherson's appointment was “a very unfortunate precedent.”1 Nevertheless, in 1933, Franklin Roosevelt appointed the first female to lead a foreign delegation, naming Ruth Bryan Owen minister to Denmark. Further progress was slow: by the mid 1970s, just twenty-four more women had succeeded Owen in heading U.S. missions abroad. The picture is much better today; about forty women served as American ambassadors in 2008, and many more were assigned to international organizations or were holding the post of chargé d'affaires, a senior position. All the same, until recently the history of women in diplomatic service has been largely one of limited opportunities, in positions that were overlooked, underappreciated, and, in the case of ambassadors' wives, unpaid.