Two women were inducted into the Marian Andersen Nebraska Women Journalists Hall of Fame during the Nebraska Press Women’s spring conference in Omaha on April 20.
Clara Bewick Colby and Maxine Moul were chosen as the 2013 honorees. The induction was conducted during a noon luncheon at Creighton University.
Clara Colby (1846 – 1916), Nebraska’s most prominent suffragist, was a newspaper editor and lecturer whose personal commitment to equal rights resulted in a national career and an international reputation. Born in England, she immigrated to Wisconsin in 1854 and entered the University of Wisconsin in 1865.
In 1872, Clara and Leonard Colby moved to Beatrice, Nebraska, where Leonard opened a law practice and Clara started a public library and community theater. As editor and publisher of The Woman’s Tribune, which originated in Beatrice in 1883, Colby provided isolated Midwestern readers with news of the national women’s suffrage movement for 26 years.
“She holds the record for the longest running suffrage newspaper published by an individual,” says Laureen Riedesel, director of the Beatrice Public Library. “While other contemporary suffrage newspapers were being published in places like Boston, San Francisco and New York City, Clara was publishing in Beatrice, Nebraska. Rather than bemoaning the remoteness of her location, she utilized it as an opportunity to write for and about the ‘Western’ women. Clara Bewick Colby traveled to suffrage conferences on both coasts and wrote about the journeys to and from the events, as well as accounts of the conference activities.” Colby was a close friend of Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Susan B. Anthony.
Maxine Moul, who has a degree in journalism from the University of Nebraska – Lincoln, began her career at the Sioux City Journal in 1969. In 1971, she and her husband, Francis, founded Maverick Media Inc., a printing and publishing firm, in southeast Nebraska and purchased Francis’ hometown newspaper in Syracuse. Maverick Media grew to eventually include five weekly rural newspapers, two magazines and eight free shopping guides. By the time the Mouls sold the business in 1988, there were 120 employees, with 80 of them in Syracuse.
Maxine was experienced in every aspect of producing a community newspaper. She wrote sports stories and feature stories, covered city government, edited, took photographs, worked in the darkroom and set type. In 1975, she took over financial management of Maverick Media and was president and CEO in the late 1980s.
In 1990, Moul entered politics and was elected lieutenant governor, serving nearly three years. At the governor’s request, Moul crafted the administration’s rural development policy and served as chair of the Nebraska Rural Development Commission. In 1993, the governor appointed her director of the Nebraska Department of Economic Development. After leaving state government, Moul served as the first chair and then president of the Nebraska Community Foundation.
Since 2009, Moul has served as the Nebraska State Director at USDA–Rural Development.
“When Maxine entered public service, she applied the skills and expertise of a good journalist to her work in government and politics. She has been an ardent and effective supporter of rural development and sustainability, continuing to serve the kinds of small communities of which her newspapers were a part,” said Charlyne Berens, professor and associate dean, University of Nebraska –Lincoln, College of Journalism and Mass Communications.
With the induction of Colby and Moul, the Marian Andersen Nebraska Women Journalists Hall of Fame includes 11 members. Nominations are open to the public, and honorees are selected by the NPW Board of Directors.
Marian Andersen Nebraska Women Journalists Hall of Fame Honorees
Wilma Crumley – 2011
Bess Furman Armstrong – 2011
Lynne Grasz – 2011
Marjorie Marlette – 2011
Beverly Pollock – 2011
Deanna Sands – 2011
Mildred Brown – 2012
Harriet Dakin MacMurphy – 2012
Mary McGrath – 2012
Clara Bewick Colby – 2013
Maxine Moul – 2013
