5 legendary Purdue women every Boilermaker should know

Purdue historian discusses legacies of Amelia Earhart, Lillian Gilbreth, Mary Matthews, Helen Schleman and Dorothy Stratton 

Most Purdue people know Amelia Earhart was a Boilermaker. 

But what about the other trailblazing women whose influence changed Purdue for the better? Do alums know about the former dean of women for whom Schleman Hall is named? Do students know why the Veteran and Military Success Center is named for Dorothy Stratton or that Matthews Hall is dedicated to the first female academic dean on campus? 

These are the stories that historian and author Angie Klink (BA communication ’81) especially loves to tell. 

“Amelia Earhart gets a lot of press, and we love her, but there are so many other stories to tell that go untold because people don’t even know they exist,” Klink says. “I’m always trying to get the story out there that’s fresh and new and that no one knows about. That’s important.” 

As is the case with several of her other works, Klink’s new book — “Purdue’s Female Founders: The Untold History of Trailblazing Women Faculty,” which Purdue University Press will publish in fall 2025 — shares the stories of Purdue women and their persistent pursuit of their ambitions. It covers multiple generations of important historical figures, from artist and professor Laura Anne Fry in the late 19th century to Christine Ladisch, who became the inaugural dean of the College of Health and Human Sciences in 2010. 

Many Boilermakers don’t know these women’s stories, but they should, Klink says. 

“That’s why it’s important to write these stories down, because other generations have no idea whose shoulders they’re standing on,” Klink says. 

As Purdue women icons, no shoulders are any broader than those of Earhart, Stratton, Lillian Gilbreth, Mary Matthews and Helen Schleman. For those who want to learn about their monumental impact on the university’s evolution, Klink is happy to share why these are five women every Boilermaker should know. 

AMELIA EARHART 

The iconic aviator’s time at Purdue was relatively brief — from 1935-37 — but her influence is evident across campus even today. 

There’s Amelia Earhart Residence Hall, which features a statue of the pilot outside the front doors. There’s the Amelia Earhart Faculty-in-Residence Program that allows participating faculty to mentor students while living in a Purdue residence hall, as Earhart did nearly a century ago. There’s the Amelia Earhart Scholarship for students who exhibit special leadership and determination. And who else could Purdue have named the new terminal building after when it brought back commercial air service to the Purdue University Airport? 

After all, Klink says, it was the airport that helped convince Earhart to accept a position at Purdue. 

“Purdue was the only college in the country that had its own airport, and that was what drew her here,” Klink says. “Plus, she wanted to influence careers for women. She really saw it as an opportunity to help women students.” 

For a few weeks each semester, Earhart lived on campus in Duhme Hall and worked as a career counselor for women students and advisor to the aeronautical engineering department. “Career counselor for women” was not exactly a job that existed anywhere else in 1935, but Earhart had already proven what women could accomplish when they pursued their dreams — and her ideas resonated with the women she befriended at Purdue like Stratton and Schleman. 

“The women students were in awe of her,” Klink says. “Who wouldn’t be? She was an international celebrity.”

(Amelia Earhart) wanted to influence careers for women. She really saw it as an opportunity to help women students.

Angie Klink (BA communication ’81) 

Purdue historian and author

Purdue’s airport was home base for Earhart’s preparations for the around-the-world flight attempt in 1937 where she went missing. The Purdue Research Foundation even financed Earhart’s purchase of a Lockheed Electra 10E airplane — she called it the “Flying Laboratory” — that she piloted during her ill-fated flight. 

After her disappearance, Earhart’s husband, George Palmer Putnam, offered a collection of her personal papers to the university because of her love for Purdue and Putnam’s appreciation of its support. 

The Amelia Earhart Collection is housed at Purdue Archives and Special Collections. Featuring nearly 5,000 items, from her flight helmet and goggles to her pilot’s license and will, it is the world’s largest collection of Earhart-related papers, memorabilia and artifacts.  

LILLIAN GILBRETH 

When describing Gilbreth’s place in history, Klink prefers to wait until the very end to mention the most common way she’s known to the general public. Leading with it feels … cheap. 

Klink would much rather share how Gilbreth became the nation’s first female engineering professor when she accepted a position with Purdue’s School of Mechanical Engineering in 1935. She became a full professor five years later and contributed to the departments of industrial engineering, industrial psychology and home economics, and she also consulted on careers for women through Stratton’s dean’s office. 

Klink would rather discuss Gilbreth’s landmark time-and-motion studies first conducted alongside her husband, Frank, and then well after Frank’s death from a heart attack at age 55. 

She’d prefer to share that Gilbreth was a pioneer in the field of industrial management, injecting psychological considerations into management theory and thereby demonstrating tactics that companies could employ to become more productive and efficient. 

But if all else fails and the other party is still unaware of Gilbreth’s story? 

“If they’re still looking out into the stars like they don’t understand, I’ll say, ‘Or have you heard of “Cheaper by the Dozen”?’” Klink says with a chuckle. 

That’s right; not only was Gilbreth “America’s First Lady of Engineering,” but her family was the subject of two semi-autobiographical books written by children Frank Jr. and Ernestine — “Cheaper by the Dozen” and “Belles on Their Toes” — that shared what it was like growing up in a household with 12 kids and two parents who test their efficiency theories at home. Both books were turned into movies in the 1950s, and “Cheaper by the Dozen” was remade in 2003 with Steve Martin and Bonnie Hunt in the lead roles. 

“To be that organized and have that many kids, the woman had a lot of energy,” Klink says. “She had a lot of drive. She knit and crocheted and made lace and walked so many steps a day. She was just an amazing person. Obviously, she used her time-and-motion studies on her own personal life.”

(Lillian Gilbreth) was just an amazing person. Obviously, she used her time-and-motion studies on her own personal life.

Angie Klink (BA communication ’81)

Purdue historian and author

In 2018, Purdue’s College of Engineering introduced the Gilbreth Postdoctoral Fellowship program to prepare recent PhD recipients for careers in engineering academia through interdisciplinary research, training and professional development. 

MARY MATTHEWS 

Matthews and her adopted mother, Virginia Meredith, are both important figures in Purdue’s history. 

Meredith, known as the “Queen of American Agriculture” in the late 19th century, became the first woman appointed to Purdue’s Board of Trustees in 1921. The university’s Meredith Hall is named in her honor. 

Her adopted daughter became the first female academic dean at Purdue in 1926 when she launched the School of Home Economics. She opened the first nursery school in the state of Indiana that same year at Purdue. 

Matthews’ commitment to sharing the latest home science with women at Purdue and beyond defined her tenure at the university. 

Klink’s book “Divided Paths, Common Ground” shares the story of Matthews and Lella Gaddis, whom Matthews hired to lead Purdue’s home economics Extension service and share knowledge about nutrition and food safety with rural women who had no connection to a college campus. 

“A lot of these things were vital for public health,” Klink says. “Mary was teaching it here on campus and Lella was taking it out to the countryside. A lot of the women were isolated on farms and they just learned from what ancestors handed down, and they’d been learning things that aren’t benefiting society at that time healthwise and efficiencywise.”

A lot of the women were isolated on farms and they just learned from what ancestors handed down, and they’d been learning things that aren’t benefiting society at that time healthwise and efficiencywise.

Angie Klink (BA communication ’81)

Purdue historian and author

After arriving at Purdue in 1910 as an Extension home economics instructor, two years later Matthews became head of the Department of Household Economics in the School of Science with 50 students under her guidance. By the time she became founding dean of the School of Home Economics in 1926, the program had 369 undergraduate students spread across five departments. 

When Matthews retired as dean in 1952, Purdue offered 150 courses in home economics (it had four in 1926) and boasted the second-largest enrollment of any U.S. home economics school. 

Constructed in 1923, the original home economics building now known as Matthews Hall was named in her honor in 1976. 

HELEN SCHLEMAN 

One could reasonably argue that no individual did more for Purdue women than Schleman (MS liberal arts ’34). 

She remains influential to many Boilermakers with whom she interacted across the generations, even if she didn’t garner the national celebrity of an Earhart or Stratton — her close friend and mentor who brought Schleman aboard as her right-hand woman while leading the women’s reserve of the U.S. Coast Guard during World War II. However, Schleman’s persistence — and absolute refusal to accept the status quo — during a 20-year stint as Purdue’s dean of women (1947-68), and later in retirement, created a legacy that is unmatched in the university’s history. 

As a Purdue administrator in the 1950s and ’60s, Schleman sometimes faced pushback within university circles for staunch feminism that conflicted with the conservatism of postwar America. But she was the driving force behind numerous activities that chipped away at the traditional gender dynamics in place at Purdue and across society in that era. 

“She was always ahead of her time,” says Klink, whose book “The Deans’ Bible” details the special bond that existed between Schleman and four other Purdue deans: Stratton, Barbara Cook, Betty Nelson and Beverley Stone. “She said she was born too early, but really she wasn’t. She was born saying and doing these things when it was really, really needed to try to wake people up.” 

Schleman won out in a long fight to eliminate Purdue’s curfew for female students, making Purdue the first Big Ten university and one of the first in the nation to do so. She also led the fight for equal hiring, pay and benefits for Purdue’s female faculty and administrators, and she was ultimately successful in a court case that ensured participants in the university retirement plan would not be discriminated against on the basis of gender. 

While serving as dean of women, Schleman invited all incoming freshman female students to her office, where she would offer an individual welcome and encourage them to complete a degree that would allow them to be self-sufficient if necessary.

(Helen Schleman) said she was born too early, but really she wasn’t. She was born saying and doing these things when it was really, really needed to try to wake people up.

Angie Klink (BA communication ’81)

Purdue historian and author

“She’d say, ‘You need your degree. Because what if, God forbid, your husband dies, or you get a divorce? You don’t think you are now, but what if that happens? You need money to fall back on, a “Go to Hell Fund,” because of those catastrophes that can happen,’” Klink says. “That was unheard of in the day, to ask a woman that, or even to expect a woman to really have that little nest egg of her own put away for emergencies.” 

In 1968, Schleman founded and led Span Plan, which supports undergraduate nontraditional students — such as parents who delayed enrolling in college until after their children started school — as they enter the world of higher education. The program remains active at Purdue to this day. 

DOROTHY STRATTON 

During her nine-year stint (1933-42) as Purdue’s first full-time dean of women, Stratton saw women’s enrollment nearly triple. This was in part due to her efforts to create opportunities for Purdue women. 

She managed construction of residence halls for women, pushed for women’s restrooms in all campus buildings and created a women’s employment placement center. She also attempted to implement a liberal arts-style curriculum geared toward women that would provide an alternative to studying home economics. 

However, her activities away from Purdue provide the first several paragraphs of her biography as a national historical figure. 

After America entered World War II, Stratton joined the U.S. Naval Women’s Reserve with encouragement from her dear friend Gilbreth, whom she called “Dr. G.” When the U.S. government created the women’s reserve of the Coast Guard, Stratton was transferred to become the program’s first director and the first woman commissioned as an officer in the Coast Guard. 

“They contacted her and said, ‘We need a woman to head up the Reserve of the Coast Guard, and you’re going to do it,’ maybe because she’d been dean of women,” Klink says. “She was very courageous and smart.” 

Stratton led the U.S. Coast Guard Women’s Reserve, which she named SPAR (an acronym for the Coast Guard fighting motto “Semper Paratus, Always Ready”), through the end of the war and eventually achieved the rank of captain. Responsible for recruiting, training and utilizing women in SPAR — which was racially integrated from the beginning, not a military norm at the time — Stratton led more than 10,000 women who enlisted during the war. In 1946, she was awarded the Legion of Merit for her contributions to women in the military.

One of (Dorothy Stratton’s) adages she often repeated was ‘To be interesting, do interesting things.’ Well, she did, fearlessly.

Angie Klink (BA communication ’81)

Purdue historian and author

In 2008, the Coast Guard named a national security cutter the USCGC Stratton in her honor. It was the first national security cutter to be named after a woman. First Lady Michelle Obama christened the ship in 2010, saying, “As a woman, and as a mother of two daughters, as an American, I stand in awe of her life of service. And after all these years later, whether you’re a woman or a man, Coast Guard or another service, whether you’re military or civilian, every American can be inspired by her example.” 

In 2023, Purdue added Stratton’s name to its Veteran and Military Success Center. 

Stratton’s societal contributions didn’t end when she left the military. In 1947, she became the first director of personnel at the International Monetary Fund. She spent three years in that position before serving for the next decade as executive director of the Girl Scouts. Stratton was also the United Nations representative of the International Federation of University Women (now known as Graduate Women International) and served on the President’s Commission on Employment of the Handicapped. 

In the 1980s, Stratton moved back to West Lafayette and shared a home with Schleman, her dear friend of more than 50 years. She died in 2006 at age 107. 

“One of her adages she often repeated was ‘To be interesting, do interesting things,’” Klink says. “Well, she did, fearlessly.” 

It’s important to write these stories down, because other generations have no idea whose shoulders they’re standing on.

Angie Klink (BA communication ’81)
Purdue historian and author