Thelma Parkinson Sharp (1898-1983) was the primary girl to run for statewide workplace in New Jersey and the primary girl to serve within the governor’s cupboard.
At age 32, she can be the youngest particular person to ever win a statewide nomination.
Thelma Parkinson – she didn’t get married till 1941 – was the Democratic nominee for U.S. Senator in 1930.
The incumbent senator, Walter Edge, resigned in 1929 to turn into the U.S. Ambassador to France. Edge had 13 months left in his second time period.
Republicans nominated one of many state’s wealthiest males, Dwight Morrow, to run in two elections in 1930: a November particular election to fill the remaining two months of Edge’s time period, and one other for a full six-12 months time period.
Morrow gained 71% of the vote in a Republican main towards Rep. Franklin Fort (R-East Orange) and former U.S. Senator Joseph Frelinghuysen.
Democrats ran State Sen. Alexander Simpson (D-Jersey City) for the complete-time period however determined to run Parkinson, a Democrat from Vineland, within the particular election as a method of attracting ladies voters to the Democratic ticket.
Morrow, a former U.S. Ambassador to Mexico and father-in-regulation of flier Charles Lindbergh, defeated Parkinson by 198,267 votes, 59%-39%. Morrow carried 19 counties, with Parkinson beating him with 69% in Hudson and 51% in Middlesex.
Parkinson ran barely higher than Simpson, who misplaced his race by 200,490 votes.
She had turn into a Democratic State Committeewoman from Cumberland County in 1924, at age 26, and was the longtime Democratic National Committeewoman from New Jersey at a time when the state had only one.
After her Senate bid, she served on the New Jersey State Board of Tax Appels from 1932 to 1945.
Known after 1941 as Thelma P. Sharp, Gov. Robert Meyner appointed her to the New Jersey Civil Service Commission in 1954.
In 1959, Meyner nominated Sharp to function Civil Service Commission president, a cupboard put up. Sharp served within the cupboard till Republican Gov. William Cahill changed her in 1970. She is the longest-serving girl cupboard member in state historical past.
She attended her first Democratic National Convention in 1924, when her occasion nominated darkish horse candidate John W. Davis on the 103rd poll to run towards President Calvin Coolidge. Parkinson seconded the nomination of House Speaker John Nance Garner for Vice President in 1932.
Sharp nominated a girl, India Edwards, for the Democratic vice presidential nomination in 1952 to run with Adlai Stevenson.
“Women in politics are no laughing matter,” she mentioned on the conference. “They could do more than knot campaign doilies and serve tea to the men folk.”
Her husband, Howard Sharp (D-Vineland), was elected to the New Jersey State Assembly in 1947 and the State Senate in 1957. He died lower than one 12 months after taking his Senate seat.