Women didn’t gain the right to vote nationally until 1920, but the first women to serve in a state legislature were elected in 1895 in Colorado. Three women, in fact: Clara Cressingham, Carrie Clyde Holly and Frances Klock were elected to the House of Representatives. It would take nearly a century—when Alabama elected Ann Bedsole to the state Senate in 1982—for every chamber nationwide to include a female legislator. Cressingham was the first woman to introduce a law when her bill to support Colorado’s nascent sugar beet industry passed, and that industry is worth about $300 million annually today. It took a lot of adjusting when women joined. For starters, statehouses didn’t have bathrooms for them. Wyoming legislators pledged not to smoke on the floor once Mary Godat Bellamy was elected, but she insisted they go ahead. When they’d light up cigars to celebrate a bill’s passage, Bellamy would accept their offer of a piece of gum to take part, but she knew her mother would be mortified that she was chewing gum in public.
According to the Associated Press, at least 2,450 women nationwide serve in state legislatures as of November, a record high.
Source: NCSL: First Women to Serve in State and Territorial Legislatures