Arabella Aurelia (Babb) Mansfield (1846 - 1911)

Belle Aurelia Babb was born May 23, 1846 in Benton, Iowa, United States. She was a daughter of Miles Babb and Mary Moyer.

While Belle was young, her father left for California in 1850 on the Flint River Company wagon train. Prior to his departure he signed a will making provisions for the educations of his children. Miles became superintendent of the Bay State Mining Company and was killed in the collapse of a mining tunnel at the Mameluke Hill mine in El Dorado, California.

Belle's mother moved with her two children to Mount Pleasant, Iowa, where they attended local schools.

In 1862, Belle started her studies at Iowa Wesleyan College in Mount Pleasant. There she began using the name Arabella (previously, she had gone by her given name of Belle). Arabella graduated in three years as valedictorian; her brother Washington Babb was a salutatorian in the same class.

Babb taught at Des Moines Conference Seminary (now Simpson College) in Indianola, Iowa for a year. She returned to Mount Pleasant to marry her college sweetheart, John Melvin Mansfield, a young professor at Iowa Wesleyan. He encouraged her in her ambition to study law. Arabella Mansfield "read the law" as an apprentice in her brother Washington's law office, after he had passed the bar and established his practice. Although by Iowa law the bar exam was restricted to "males over 21," Arabella Mansfield took the exam in 1869, passing it with high scores.

In 1869, Iowa became the first state in the union to admit women to the practice of law after Mansfield challenged the state law excluding her. The Court ruled that women may not be denied the right to practice law in Iowa, admitting Mansfield to the bar. Mansfield was sworn in at the Union Block building in Mount Pleasant that year.

Although admitted to the bar, Mansfield did not practice law, concentrating on college teaching and activist work. She taught at Iowa Wesleyan College, followed by DePauw University in Greencastle, Indiana. In 1893 she was selected as Dean of the School of Art at DePauw, and in 1894 as Dean of the School of Music. In 1893, Mansfield joined the National League of Women Lawyers.

Mansfield was also active in the women's suffrage movement, chairing the Iowa Women’s Suffrage Convention in 1870, and working with Susan B. Anthony.

Mansfield died Aug. 1, 1911, at the home of her brother, Washington I. Babb, in Aurora, Illinois. She was buried at Forest Home Cemetery in Mount Pleasant, Henry County, Iowa, United States.

Research Notes and Clarification

• Margaret Brent was the first woman to serve as an attorney, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Margaret_Brent.
• Other notable women trailblazers in the law. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_first_women_lawyers_and_judges_in_the_United_States

Sources

• "United States Census, 1860", database with images, FamilySearch (https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:M82V-KMG : 18 February 2021), Arubella Babb in entry for Mary Babb, 1860.

• "Iowa Marriages, 1809-1992", database, FamilySearch (https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:XJLR-CTP : 14 January 2020), Arabella A. Babb in entry for John M. Mansfield, 1868.

• "United States Census, 1870", database with images, FamilySearch (https://www.familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:MDV7-PZF : 28 May 2021), Bell A Mansfield in entry for Mary Babb, 1870.

• "Illinois Deaths and Burials, 1749-1999", database, FamilySearch (https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:HGBB-KVN2 : 14 February 2020), Belle A. Mansfield, 1911.

• Find A Grave: Memorial #11263796 https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/11263796/arabella-mansfield

See also:

• Wikipedia: Arabella Mansfield
• Wikidata: Item Q4309864, en:Wikipedia