(Boyd County, 1867-1933) In 1921, Mary Elliott Flanery was the first woman elected to the Kentucky State legislature and was named Kentucky’s Most Prominent by the Kentucky Historical Society. She appealed to the things the “good people back home needed: hard roads and plenty of them, good schools and more of them, and a real Eastern Normal School” Additionally, Flanery focused her concerns on Kentucky’s marriage and divorce laws, educational reform, and sponsored the Shepard-Towner Maternity Act. She introduced the bill that created Morehead State Teachers College. Mary Elliott Flanery was a University of Kentucky graduate and taught in Elliot and Carter Counties. In addition to being part of the Kentucky Legislature and educator, Flannery was a journalist for the Ashland Daily Independent. In her weekly column, “Impressions of Kentucky’s Legislature,” Flanery called for social change. An active volunteer in her community, she fought for women’s suffrage through the KY Equal Rights Commission, and was active in both the Daughters of the Revolution and General Federation of Women’s Clubs of Kentucky. In 1926, Ms. Flanery founded the John Milton Elliott chapter of the United Daughters of the Confederacy. After her death in 1933, a bronze marker was affixed to her seat number 40 in the House of Representatives, as a permanent memorial of her service to the Commonwealth.