reformer, suffragist, b. Winneshiek County, Iowa. In 1888 she married Ben Hooper, Oshkosh lawyer, and almost immediately became prominent in Wisconsin civic reform groups and women's organizations. She campaigned in Wisconsin for a children's code, raising the age of consent for women, jury service, and the protection of women in industry. An ardent suffragist, she worked in the Wisconsin Suffrage Association, lectured widely, and lobbied in Washington in behalf of the 19th amendment. After woman's suffrage was enacted, the National Woman's Suffrage Association became the National League of Women Voters; Mrs. Hooper was first president of the Wisconsin branch. In 1922 she was Wisconsin's unsuccessful Democratic nominee for the U.S. Senate, and during World War I was active in Red Cross work, Liberty Loan drives, and food conservation. Following the war, she became interested in world peace, and with Carrie Chapman Catt organized the Conference on the Cause and Cure for War (1928). In 1932 the Conference sent her to the Geneva Disarmament Conference with a gigantic peace petition, and in 1933 she campaigned widely for U.S. entry into the World Court. Her health undermined by extensive travel and campaigning, she died in Oshkosh in 1935. Dict. Amer. Biog., Suppl. 1; Who's Who in Amer., 18 (1934); Oshkosh Daily Northwestern, May 8, 1935; J. A. J. Hooper Papers.

The Wisconsin Historical Society has manuscripts related to this topic. See the catalog description of the Jessie Jack Hooper Papers for details.

View a related article at Wisconsin Magazine of History Archives.

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[Source: Dictionary of Wisconsin biography]