Charlene Hampton Holloway, Author, Civil Rights Activist, Louisville, KY

National League of American Pen Women (NLAPW)

Commonly Asked Questions

1.Who are Pen Women?We are professional women involved in the arts, letters, and music. We are comprised of writers (eg. fiction writers, poets, journalists, translators, and historians), visual artists (eg. painters, illustrators, sculptors, photographers), performing arts (eg. composers, musicians, dancers, and motivational speakers, among others), and more.

Founded in 1897, when women journalists were not permitted to join male-only professional organizations, NLAPW has had such prestigious members as Vinnie Ream, Eudora Welty, Pearl Buck, and Eleanor Roosevelt, among others.

2.What do Pen Women do?We are a sisterhood of talented women who are dedicated to our craft and to sharing our passion for arts with others. We also mentor younger women to become professionals in their artistic fields.

3.Do Pen Women help our community?Yes. In addition to mentoring younger women to become professionals in their artistic fields, Pen Women have donated food to Central Union Mission, and purchased school supplies, filling up brand new backpacks for children in need in Washington, D.C.

4.Who was Vinnie Ream? Lavinia Ellen Ream Hoxie was one of the founding members of the NLAPW. Born in 1847, the many talented Ream lived an extraordinarily feminist life, especially for those times. In 1862, at the tender age of 15, Vinnie Ream was one of the first women permitted to work as a clerk at the dead letter office of the United States Post Office. And during the Civil War, she gave concerts, singing for wounded soldiers at Washington, D.C. hospitals.

At the age of 18, Vinnie Ream received a commission from the U.S. government to sculpt a statue of Abraham Lincoln. She was then the youngest artist and first woman to receive such a commission, Her full-size statue of Lincoln sits in the U.S. Capitol rotunda today. Vinnie Ream also sculpted the statue of Admiral David G. Farragut, located in Farragut Square, and a statue of Sequoyah, which was the first free-standing statue of a Native American to be placed in the U.S. Capitol’s Statuary Hall.