2 inducted in Alabama Women’s Hall of Fame

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Alabama Womens Hall of Fame

The Alabama Women’s Hall of Fame (AWHF), founded in 1970 and housed on the campus of Judson College in Marion, honored two new inductees this week. In a ceremony Thursday, Sarah Haynsworth Gayle and Ann Mae Beddow joined the ranks of such AWHF elites as Rosa Parks, Zelda Fitzgerald, and Lurleen B. Wallace.

Gayle became first lady of Alabama when her husband, John Gayle, was elected the seventh governor of the state. With only an elementary education, Sarah Gayle wrote detailed accounts of early life in Alabama she kept in a personal journal from 1827 to 1835.

Her plaque featured only an outline, since no portrait is available.

Beddow was inducted for a variety of accomplishments. Born at the turn of the 20th century, she was inducted into the Army Nurse Corps and became a lieutenant. She won a Victory Medal for her work as a nurse anesthetist during World War I, and she pioneered the method of intravenously providing pentothal sodium for major surgeries.

Further, Beddow was elected president of the Alabama Nurses Association in 1926 and, shortly thereafter, became a founding member of the American Association of Nurse Anesthetists.

Women being inducted into the AWHF can be nominated via the group’s website. Nominees must have been deceased for two years and have lived in, or been associated with, the state of Alabama. Nominees are approved by a unanimous vote from AWHF’s Board of Directors.

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