14 Facts About Frances Melville

Frances Melville was president of the British Federation of University Women from 1935 to 1942.

Frances Melville was one of seven children; five brothers and two sister.

Frances Melville spent her childhood in Edinburgh, where she was educated at George Watson's Ladies' College and later studied music for a year in Germany.

Frances Melville graduated five years later in 1897 with a first class MA Honours degree in Philosophy.

In 1910 Frances Melville was awarded a Bachelor of Divinity degree by the University of St Andrews, the first woman in Scotland to graduate with this degree.

From 1899 to 1909 Frances Melville held the post of Warden of University Hall at the University of St Andrews.

Rackstraw was hoping to compile data from all Scottish universities in support of women's potential for governmental service and sought Frances Melville's help to provide information on Glasgow's female graduates.

At the height of her career, Frances Melville was the most senior female academic in Scotland, notable for her academic achievements and administrative abilities.

Frances Melville was the first woman academic to receive an honorary degree from the university.

In King's Birthday Honours list of 1935 Frances Melville was awarded an OBE.

Frances Melville argued that all women should have access to a general education and that the false dichotomy between the female ideals of domesticity and professionalism had a damaging influence on attitudes to women's education.

Frances Melville was an active and prominent Suffragist and a member of the Edinburgh National Society for Women's Suffrage, the Scottish Universities Women's Suffrage Union, the Glasgow Women Citizens' Association and the Glasgow Society for Equal Citizenship.

In 1937, after the death of Ramsay MacDonald, Frances Melville stood as an independent candidate in the Scottish Universities by-election, which was won by Sir John Anderson.

Frances Melville came second, ahead of Andrew Dewar Gibb and Sir Peter Chalmers Mitchell, with 5618 votes.