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Awards

Iowa Organization of Women Attorneys and Iowa Chapter of the National Bar Association hosted members and guests at their annual luncheon on July 13th to present two awards that recognize exemplary women attorneys who personify the awards’ namesakes.  The Honorable Mary Tabor received the 2024 Arabella Mansfield Award and Retired AUSA Stephanie Wright received the 2024 Gertrude Rush Award.

Arabella Mansfield Award recipient Judge Mary Tabor, with Judge Celeste Bremer Nominator Judge Celeste Bremer with Gertrude Rush Award recipient Stephanie Wright. 

& nominator Judge Anuradha Vaitheswaran.

Arabella Mansfield Award

  • Established in 2002
  • Recognizes outstanding women lawyers in Iowa who have promoted and nurtured women in the legal profession

Arabella Mansfield, also commonly known as Belle Babb Mansfield, was the first woman lawyer admitted to the practice of law in the United States. Ms. Mansfield studied law in her brother's law office for two years and was admitted to the Iowa Bar in 1869. She was admitted despite the fact that Iowa law required an applicant for bar admission be white, male, and over the age of 21. Arabella and her husband taught at Iowa Wesleyan College, then moved to Greencastle, Indiana in 1876, to teach at DePauw University. She served as Dean of the School of Art in 1893, and Dean of the School of Music in 1894. She was also active in the women's suffrage movement, chairing the Iowa Women's Suffrage Convention in 1870, but died in 1911, nine years before women obtained the right to vote. She was inducted into the Iowa Women's Hall of Fame in 1980.

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Gertrude Rush Award

  • Co-established in 2003 and co-sponsored with the Iowa Chapter of the National Bar Association in 2003
  • Recognizes a lawyer who manifests the pioneering spirit of Gertrude Rush, demonstrates leadership in the community and in the legal profession, and demonstrates concern for human and civil rights

Gertrude Rush was the first African-American woman to be admitted to the practice of law in Iowa, in 1918. She began to study law in 1908 under the tutoring of her husband, James Rush. She sat for and passed the Iowa bar examination in the summer of 1918. She was the first and only African-American woman practicing law in Iowa, until 1953, when Willie Stevenson Glanton was admitted to practice law in Iowa. Gertrude Rush became one of the founders of the National Bar Association after she and four other black lawyers were denied membership in the American Bar Association in 1924. The National Bar Association was officially founded in 1925 and incorporated in 1926. Gertrude Rush was also a composer of religious songs and was active in many church and civic organizations.

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Previous Award Recipients

Arabella Mansfield Award

  • 2024
  • Judge Mary Tabor
  • 2023
  • Jaki Samuelson
  • 2022
  • Roxanne Conlin
  • 2021
  • Judge Annette Scieszinski, post-humous
  • 2020
  • Mary Pat Gunderson
  • 2019
    Judge Anuradha Vaitheswaran
  • 2018
    Judge Eliza Ovrom
  • 2017
    Justice Linda Neuman
  • 2016
    Ruth Cooperrider
  • 2015
    Dean Linda McGuire
  • 2014
    Paige Fiedler
  • 2013
    Gail Klearman
  • 2012
    Hon. Judge Donna Paulsen
  • 2011
    Lu Ann White
  • 2010
    Jeana Goosmann
  • 2009
    Judge Rosemary Shaw Sackett
  • 2008
    Chris Luzzie
  • 2007
    Judge Ruth Klotz
  • 2006
    Michelle "Miki" McGovern
  • 2005
    Deborah Tharnish
  • 2004
    Emily Gould Chafa
  • 2003
    Judge Celeste Bremer
  • 2002
    Roxann Ryan
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    Gertrude Rush Award

    • 2024
    • Stephanie Wright
    • 2023
    • Deborah Petersen
    • 2022
    • Judge Odell McGhee
    • 2021
    • Chief Justice Susan Christensen
    • 2020
    • Helen Miller
    • 2019
      Vicky Long Hill
    • 2018
      Kristina Stanger
    • 2017
      Erin Lain
    • 2016
      Angela Onwuachi-Willig
    • 2015
      Judge Karen Romano
    • 2014
      Shontavia Johnson
    • 2013
      Sharon Malheiro
    • 2012
      Barbara Schwartz
    • 2011
      Bonnie Campbell
    • 2010
      Chinyere Ukabiala
    • 2009
      Roxanne Conlin
    • 2008
      Romonda Belcher
    • 2007
      Judge Artis Reis
    • 2006
      Adrien Wing
    • 2005
      Inga Bumbary-Langston
    • 2004
      Diann Wilder-Tomlinson
    • 2003
      Willie Glanton
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