From collection Candidates
Emma J. McVicker campaigned for State Superintendent of Schools in Utah in 1895-6 on the Republican ticket. Her candidacy was curtailed because of the ambiguity of federal law affecting the women of the Utah Territory as it was transitioning to state status. In 1900 the governor appointed her to fill out the term of John R. Park, the Utah superintendent of education .McVicker was a prominent suffrage and education activist in Utah, where she was a leader of various women's clubs including the Utah Federation of Women's Clubs, the Utah Kindergarten Association, the Utah Women's Press Club as well as the State Republican League. She strongly supported the addition of kindergartens to the education system. McVicker was an outspoken critic of the practice of polygamy in Utah.
McVicker was born in Watertown, New York and educated at several colleges and universities. She worked as a teacher and principal. In 1886, at the age of forty, she married John McVicker. She died in 1916.
