Amy Parmelee attended Northwestern University and graduated Phi Beta Kappa in 1904. After graduation, she was active locally and nationally in sorority affairs: national president of her sorority, Delta Delta Delta, longtime editor of its national magazine, and president of the National Panhellenic Council, among other positions.
She was also active in several Evanston-based organization including the League of Women Voters of Evanston (where she served as president), the North End Mothers’ Club, the Woman’s Club of Evanston, the Evanston Community Church, and the Evanston Hospital board. According to one report, she was the Red Cross chairman for her ward during World War I. In addition, she worked with a Chicago-area employment bureau for college women.
In the early 1930s Amy Parmelee left Evanston to attend the University of Illinois and earned a master’s degree. Soon after, she moved to Boulder, CO, and became Dean of Women at Colorado A&M (now Colorado State University). A dorm there is named in her honor.
Amy Olgen married Egbert Nelson Parmelee, in 1906. He died in 1922.
Father: Albert Olgen
Mother: Elizabeth Gotschall
Children: 2: Egbert and Elizabeth
Education: Northwestern University, bachelor’s degree, 1904 University of Illinois, master’s degree, 1933 (she was much older than most of her classmates)
Years in Evanston: approximately 1899-1904 as a student at Northwestern and 1920 through the early 1930s
Sources: newspapers.com: Chicago Tribune, Inter Ocean. Fort Collins Coloradoan; Evanston City Directory for 1922-1923; findagrave.com; Themis of Zeta Tau Alpha, March 1924, Vol 22, No 3, pp. 371-373 [Downloaded on December 13, 2021 from https://books.google.com/books?id=hiPOAAAAMAAJ]; Udell, Erin. A little history: Who was your CSU dorm named after? The Coloradoan, August 14, 2018. [Downloaded on December 9, 2021 from https://www.coloradoan.com/story/life/2018/08/14/who-your-colorado-state-university-dorm-named-after/975498002/]; League of Women Voters of Evanston archives at the Evanston History Center
