Maude Frazier
Maude Frazier was an American educator and politician who served as the 22nd lieutenant governor of Nevada. A member of the Democratic Party, Frazier was a member of the Nevada Assembly, elected to represent Clark County from 1950 to 1962.
Before running for office, Frazier was a Nevada deputy superintendent of public instruction over Southern Nevada from 1921 to 1927. For the following twenty years, from 1927 to 1947, she served as principal of Las Vegas High School and superintendent of the Las Vegas Union School District, which in 1956 became the Clark County School District.
As an assemblywoman, Frazier was a vocal proponent of establishing a public university in Southern Nevada. As chair of the education committee and a member of the ways and means committee, she secured the legislature’s support to establish the University of Nevada, Las Vegas.
Early life and career
Frazier was born on April 4, 1881, near Baraboo, Wisconsin, to William Henry Frazier and Mary Emma Frazier, both of Scottish heritage.Raised on a farm in Sauk County, she graduated from the Wisconsin State Normal School and began teaching in a small town.
In 1906, she moved to Genoa, Nevada, which offered her the position of principal and upper-grades teacher in a two-teacher schoolhouse.
Until 1912, Frazier was a teacher and principal in the northern Nevada communities of Lovelock and Seven Troughs before heading south to Beatty. Between 1912 and 1917, she taught in Goldfield, Nevada before becoming principal of Sparks Elementary School in 1917, supervising a staff of 19 teachers.
In 1921, Frazier was hired by the Nevada Board of Education to be one of state's four deputy superintendents of public instruction over Southern Nevada. As deputy superintendent, she supervised 75 schools in 63 school districts with 2,824 students over, covering all of Clark, Lincoln, Esmeralda, and Nye counties.
Since road infrastructure was underdeveloped in the desert southwest in the 1920s, Frazier drove a Dodge roadster along the abandoned railroad track bed of the Las Vegas and Tonopah Railroad, which had been decommissioned after World War I. An historical profile of Frazier in the Las Vegas Review-Journal stated that contemporary sources claim she was the first person to drive the 180 miles between Las Vegas and Goldfield in one day.
Frazier secured $187,000 to construct a new Las Vegas High School after the original burned down; the 1930s Art Deco structure she commissioned remains on the National Register of Historic Places. She retired from the district in 1946 but remained active in civic affairs and education policy. She was a member of the Las Vegas local union of the Federation of Business and Professional Women.
Nevada Assembly (1950–1962)
Frazier first ran for the Nevada Assembly in 1948 and was elected in 1950, serving on the education committee, the ways and means committee, and the state library committee.Although known for securing increases in education funding, she also sponsored two successful constitutional amendments reforming the Nevada Legislature: one that limits the number of days for which state lawmakers can receive compensation during a single session, and the other repealing the constitutionally fixed duration of legislative sessions. The intent of the first amendment was to encourage efficient use of time by lawmakers, and the second enabled future adjustments through ordinary legislative processes rather than constitutional amendment.
She was a member of the Assembly ways and means committee for four consecutive sessions beginning in 1955 and became the first woman in Nevada history to serve on a state budget committee. For all six terms, she was chair of the education committee and served variously on the elections, social welfare, and state libraries committees.
She co-authored the 1955 bill establishing a southern campus of the University of Nevada. First named Nevada Southern University, it would become an independent institution and be renamed the University of Nevada, Las Vegas.
With an increasing population, many Southern Nevadans began advocating for a local college or university, especially the roughly 2,500 federal employees who worked for the Bureau of Reclamation and the Bureau of Land Management, in addition to airmen stationed at Nellis Air Force Base.
Although most of the demand came from Boulder City and Henderson, Frazier believed that a more central location in the Las Vegas Valley would reach more students effectively in the long run. Private, out-of-state institutions such as Brigham Young University in Utah had planned to begin establishing satellite campuses in the region. While most legislators from Northern Nevada argued that college-bound students could go to Reno or out of state, Frazier and others advocated for local accessibility and for keeping tuition dollars in the local economy instead of sending them elsewhere.
She helped secure a $200,000 state appropriation, contingent on $100,000 in local fundraising, and led grassroots efforts in which high school seniors canvassed Las Vegas neighborhoods for donations. In 1956, Frazier turned the first shovel of dirt for what became UNLV’s first building, Maude Frazier Hall. In 1955, the University of Nevada, Reno awarded Frazier an honorary Doctor of Letters.
Lieutenant governor of Nevada
On July 13, 1962, at age 81, Governor Grant Sawyer appointed Frazier to be lieutenant governor following the death of Rex Bell, a Republican. Frazier resigned her seat as assemblywoman to become the first woman to hold a state-wide, constitutional office in Nevada.Frazier was chosen for the role due to the particular problems arising from Bell's death. As relatively young head of the Nevada Republican Party, his unexpected death left a power vacuum and prompted a highly-contentious contest close to the primary election.
State law requires that when a vacancy is filled by appointment, the appointee must be from the same political party as the person originally elected. In this case, Sawyer was a Democrat, but Nevada elects each office independently, so the seat in question had been held by a Republican. He should have appointed a Republican rather than Frazier, a fellow Democrat. However, the state Republican Party did not want Sawyer to sway who would be chosen as head of their party, and let him appoint Frazier. Her choice was also well received due to her history in state education leadership and her decade in the Assembly prior to appointment.
She served until January 1963, the remaining six months in Bell’s term. Although, the role of lieutenant governor has few powers and is considered effectively "part time," Frazier served as acting governor on September 6 and 7 when the governor was in California.
She decided not to run for lieutenant governor nor return to the state assembly, choosing instead to retire from public office.
Legacy and death
She died in her sleep on June 20, 1963, at the age of 82, just six months after she left office.In the Las Vegas Sun, Governor Grant Sawyer reacted to her death, saying, “She was such a champion of public education and a distinguished member of the state legislature for many years. My family and I have lost a good friend, and the people of Nevada have lost one of their strongest supporters.”
Maude Frazier Hall on the campus of the University of Nevada, Las Vegas was named after her to commemorate her role as chairwoman of the Nevada Assembly committee responsible for the legislation creating the university. The building was constructed and named after her in 1957 and served as the university’s administrative offices. In 2009, the building was demolished when repair costs exceeded the cost of replacement. A portion of the building’s wall was retained as a memorial, in which a bronze bust of Frazier was installed along with a plaque.
In 2024, the Red Cross of Southern Nevada inaugurated an annual award named after Frazier for its volunteers who “exemplify the spirit of volunteerism and community service,” named the Maude Frazier Founder’s Award.
She did not marry nor have children, though she did have an active social life and relationships.