Jessie Bigwood

Jessie Bigwood
Born1874
Plattsburgh, New York
DiedSeptember 23, 1953
Toronto, Canada
OccupationLawyer
Parent(s)Frank Lafountain and Helen Payette[1]

Jessie Lafountain Bigwood (1874 – September 23, 1953) was Vermont's first female lawyer.[2][3][1]

She was born in 1874 to Frank Lafountain and Helen Payette in Plattsburgh, New York. At the age of sixteen, she graduated early from high school and thereafter attended the Burlington Business School to study bookkeeping and stenography. She served as a government reporter at Fort Ethan Allen. In 1898, she married Frederick H. Bigwood and began working for V.A. Bullard, Esq.[4] Bigwood took a law course at Boston University in 1900, and by 1902, became the first female lawyer in Vermont after successfully completing her oral examination.[5][6] Bigwood died on September 23, 1953, in Toronto, Canada. During the final months of her life, a widowed Bigwood supplemented her pension by working as a nurse's aide.

  1. ^ a b by, Kimberly Lamay Licursi and Celine Racine Paquette, Foreword (2018-04-16). Franco-Americans in the Champlain Valley. Arcadia Publishing. ISBN 9781467127868.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
  2. ^ Weatherford, Doris (2012-01-20). Women in American Politics: History and Milestones. SAGE. ISBN 9781608710072.
  3. ^ Kunin, Madeleine M. (2012-03-22). "Vermont Women in History". HuffPost. Retrieved 2019-08-24.
  4. ^ Duffy, John J.; Hand, Samuel B.; Orth, Ralph H. (2003). The Vermont Encyclopedia. UPNE. ISBN 9781584650867.
  5. ^ "Jessie Lafountain Bigwood (1874-1953) Papers, 1886-1988 MSA 391" (PDF). Vermont Historical Society.
  6. ^ The New England Business Directory and Gazetteer for ... Sampson & Murdock Company. 1908.