Pauline Van de Graaf Orr

Orr was born in Chickasaw County, Mississippi, the daughter of Jehu Amaziah Orr and Cornelia Ewing Van de Graaf Orr. Her father was a federal judge and state legislator, and a Confederate States Army officer during the American Civil War.^[1] Her mother was from Alabama.^[2][3] Governor, senator, and Speaker of the House James Lawrence Orr was her uncle.^[1]

Orr attended a boys' school, because she wanted to learn Latin and mathematics. She pursued further education at Packer Collegiate Institute in New York, and studied German at the Diehl School for Oratory.^[4] Later in life, in 1912, she earned a master's degree from Columbia University.^[2][3]

From 1885, when the school opened, Orr was head of the English department at Mississippi's new Industrial Institute and College for the Education of White Women (now the Mississippi University for Women).^[5] She remained on the school's faculty for 28 years, until her resignation in 1913.^[6][7] One of her students was writer Blanche Colton Williams. Orr said of her career at the Institute, "I have desired, above everything else, the mental enfranchisement of the girls of Mississippi. I have tried to help them to realize and express themselves."^[3]

Orr was also a sought-after speaker off-campus. In 1891, she spoke on women's education to the Mississippi Teachers' Association.^[2][4] In 1915, she spoke on "Women's Clubs and Modern Industrial Life" at the Carnegie Library in Jackson, Mississippi.^[8]

After leaving academia, Orr was active in the Mississippi Woman Suffrage Association,^[4] and testified in favor of women's suffrage at a hearing in the Mississippi State House of Representatives in 1914. In 1915, she became president of the association, and in that capacity lectured across the state,^[9] attended suffrage meetings in other states,^[10] and organized local suffrage groups and events.^[11] She was also active in the Daughters of the American Revolution.^[2][3]