Esther Neira de Calvo
Esther Neira de Calvo (1890–1978) was a prominent educator, feminist and women's right advocate. She was the first woman elected as a National Deputy to the Third Constituent Assembly in Panama. She was the founder and president of the National Society for the Advancement of Women and of the Women's Patriotic League, and actively worked for Panamanian women's enfranchisement, finally attained in 1945–46. She served as Executive Secretary of the Inter American Commission of Women from 1949 to 1965 and was Panama's Ambassador to the Council of the Organization of American States from 1966 to 1968. Biography Esther Neira de Calvo was born on May 1, 1890, in Penonomé, Coclé, when the Isthmus of Panama was a Colombian Department. Her parents were Rafael Neira Ayala, member of the National Constituent Assembly of the Republic of Panama in 1904, and Julia Laffargue de Neira. She began her studies in Penonomé and Taboga, continuing in Panama City at the Normal school for Women. In 1904, soon after Panama separated from Colombia, the first Government of the Republic of Panama offered her a scholarship to study education in Belgium. She spent the next eight years studying at the Pedagogic Institute Wavre Notre Dame,