Stone, Ursula Batchelder

Ursula Batchelder Stone was born June 26, 1900 in Faribault, Minnesota. As a girl, she attended Shattuck-St. Mary’s School; in 1918, she enrolled at Bryn Mawr College. In 1922, she graduated with a B.A., continuing with one year of graduate work in economics at Bryn Mawr. She enrolled in the School of Commerce and Administration at the University of Chicago in 1925. In 1929, she became the first woman to earn a Ph.D. in business from an American university with the acceptance of her dissertation, entitled “The Baking Industry with Special Reference to the Bread-Making Industry in Chicago.” While completing the dissertation, she married School of Business faculty member Raleigh Stone.

Throughout the 1930s, Stone worked with her close friend, Rachel Marshall Goetz, as the Batchelder and Marshall Research Service. Together, they conducted independent research and published detailed reports of their findings for a variety of Chicago companies. Stone also held the presidency of the Hyde Park League of Women Voters from 1939-1941. In 1939, she joined the faculty of George Williams College, lecturing in economics and social sciences. She remained on the faculty until the college moved from Hyde Park to suburban Downers Grove in 1965.

In 1952, Stone was elected as the only female on the Committee of Five, which then established the South East Chicago Commission. The SECC spearheaded the Hyde Park-Kenwood Urban Renewal Project of the 1950s and 60s, leading to massive commercial and residential redevelopment between 39th and 67th streets. Stone passed away in 1985.