By: History.com Editors

1932

Hattie Wyatt Caraway becomes first woman elected to U.S. Senate

History.com Editors

Published: March 02, 2010

Last Updated: January 31, 2025

Hattie Ophelia Wyatt Caraway, a Democrat from Arkansas, becomes the first woman to be elected to the U.S. Senate. Caraway, born near Bakerville, Tennessee, had been appointed to the Senate two months earlier to fill the vacancy left by her late husband, Thaddeus Horatio Caraway. With the support of Huey Long, a powerful senator from Louisiana, Caraway was elected to the seat. In 1938, she was reelected. After failing to win renomination in 1944, she was appointed to the Federal Employees Compensation Commission by President Franklin Roosevelt.

Although she was the first freely elected female senator, Caraway was preceded in the Senate by Rebecca Latimer Felton, who was appointed in 1922 to fill a vacancy but never ran for election. Jeannette Rankin, elected to the House of Representatives as a pacifist from Montana in 1917, was the first woman to ever sit in Congress.

Groundbreaking Women in Politics

From historical figures like Jeannette Rankin, the first woman in Congress, to modern ones like Tammy Duckworth, the first disabled person in Congress, meet 5 women who have paved the way for others in politics.

Timeline

Also on This Day in History

Discover more of the major events, famous births, notable deaths and everything else history-making that happened on January 12th

1777

Hugh Mercer dies from wounds received in Battle of Princeton

On January 12, 1777, American Brigadier General Hugh Mercer dies from the seven bayonet wounds he received during the Battle of Princeton. Mercer’s military service ranged over two continents and three armies. Born in Rosehearty, Scotland, Mercer studied medicine at the University of Aberdeen and first served as an assistant surgeon in Bonnie Prince Charlie’s […]

1838

Joseph Smith flees Ohio

After his bank fails in the Panic of 1837, Joseph Smith flees Kirtland, Ohio, to avoid arrest and heads for Missouri to rebuild his religious community. A sensitive and religious-minded man since his youth, Joseph Smith claimed the angel Moroni visited him in 1823, when he was 17 years old, and told him he was […]

1888

Blizzard brings tragedy to Northwest Plains

On January 12, 1888, the so-called “Schoolchildren’s Blizzard” kills 235 people, many of whom were children on their way home from school, across the Northwest Plains region of the United States. The storm came with no warning, and some accounts say that the temperature fell nearly 100 degrees in just 24 hours. It was a […]

1904

Henry Ford sets speed record

On January 12, 1904, Henry Ford sets a land-speed record of 91.37 mph on the frozen surface of Michigan’s Lake St. Clair. He was driving a four-wheel vehicle, dubbed the “999,” with a wooden chassis but no body or hood. Ford’s record was broken within a month at Ormond Beach, Florida, by a driver named […]

1919

Leaders of the Big Four nations meet for the first time in Paris

The day after British Prime Minister David Lloyd George’s arrival in Paris, he meets with representatives from the other Big Four nations—Prime Ministers Georges Clemenceau of France and Vittorio Orlando of Italy and President Woodrow Wilson of the United States—at the French Foreign Ministry on the Quai d’Orsay, for the first of what will be […]

1926

Original “Amos ‘n’ Andy” debuts on Chicago radio

On January 12, 1926, the two-man comedy series “Sam ‘n’ Henry” debuts on Chicago’s WGN radio station. Two years later, after changing its name to “Amos ‘n’ Andy,” the show becomes one of the most popular radio programs in American history. Though the creators and the stars of the new radio program, Freeman Gosden and […]

1943

Soviet forces penetrate the siege of Leningrad

On January 12, 1943, Soviet troops create a breach in the German siege of Leningrad, which had lasted for a year and a half. The Soviet forces punched a hole in the siege, which ruptured the German encirclement and allowed for more supplies to come in along Lake Ladoga. Upon invading the Soviet Union in […]

1954

U.S. announces policy of “massive retaliation” against Communist aggressors

In a speech at a Council on Foreign Relations dinner in his honor, Secretary of State John Foster Dulles announces that the United States will protect its allies through the “deterrent of massive retaliatory power.” The policy announcement was further evidence of the Eisenhower administration’s decision to rely heavily on the nation’s nuclear arsenal as […]

1969

In epic Super Bowl upset, Jets make good on Namath guarantee

On January 12, 1969, at the Orange Bowl in Miami, the New York Jets of the American Football League defeat the NFL’s Baltimore Colts, 16-7, in Super Bowl III—a result considered one of the biggest upsets in sports history. Days earlier, Jets quarterback Joe Namath guaranteed a victory by New York, an 18-point underdog. The […]

1981

“Dynasty” premieres on ABC

The oil tycoon Blake Carrington (John Forsythe) prepares to marry his former secretary, the beautiful and innocent Krystle (Linda Evans), in the three-hour television movie that kicks off the prime-time ABC soap opera Dynasty on January 12, 1981. Over the next eight years, the Carringtons, a rich Denver oil clan, and another wealthy family, the […]

1986

Franklin Chang-Diaz becomes the first Hispanic American to fly in space

On January 12,1986, astronaut and physicist Franklin Chang-Diaz becomes the first Hispanic American to fly in space on the Space Shuttle Columbia, which orbited Earth 96 times, deployed the SATCOM KU satellite used for broadcast television and conducted experiments in astrophysics. It was a high point in an aeronautical career with plenty of high points. […]

1995

Malcolm X’s daughter arrested for attempted murder

Qubilah Shabazz, the daughter of Malcolm X, is arrested for conspiring to kill Louis Farrakhan. Shabazz believed that Farrakhan was responsible for the assassination of her father in 1965, and sought to exact revenge through a hired killer. Subsequently, Shabazz admitted her “responsibility,” but not her guilt of the charges, and the government accepted a […]

2010

Massive earthquake strikes Haiti

Haiti is devastated by a massive earthquake on January 12, 2010, Haiti. It drew an outpouring of support from around the globe but the small island nation has yet to fully recover.

Haiti Earthquake, 2010

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Citation Information

Article title
Hattie Wyatt Caraway becomes first woman elected to U.S. Senate
Website Name
History
Date Accessed
March 25, 2025
Publisher
A&E Television Networks
Last Updated
January 31, 2025
Original Published Date
March 02, 2010

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