Katharine Gibbs (also Catharine Ryan and Katherine Ryan) (1863–1934) was the founder of

Gibbs College Katharine Gibbs College was a for-profit institution of higher learning based in the United States of America, founded by Katharine Gibbs. As the Providence School in Rhode Island, it was founded in 1911 as an institution for the career educati ...

, which became a for-profit institution of higher education. Catharine Ryan was born in

Galena, Illinois Galena is the largest city in and the county seat of Jo Daviess County, Illinois, with a population of 3,308 at the 2020 census. A section of the city is listed on the National Register of Historic Places as the Galena Historic District. The ci ...

on January 10, 1863, and was the granddaughter of

Irish Catholic Irish Catholics are an ethnoreligious group native to Ireland whose members are both Catholic and Irish. They have a large diaspora, which includes over 36 million American citizens and over 14 million British citizens (a quarter of the British ...

immigrants. Her father was a successful

meat packing The meat-packing industry (also spelled meatpacking industry or meat packing industry) handles the slaughtering, processing, packaging, and distribution of meat from animals such as cattle, pigs, sheep and other livestock. Poultry is generally no ...

merchant who sent her to be educated by two

spinsters ''Spinster'' is a term referring to an unmarried woman who is older than what is perceived as the prime age range during which women usually marry. It can also indicate that a woman is considered unlikely to ever marry. The term originally den ...

from

New England New England is a region comprising six states in the Northeastern United States: Connecticut, Maine, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Rhode Island, and Vermont. It is bordered by the state of New York to the west and by the Canadian provinces ...

who provided her with a cultural education. She then graduated from the Manhattanville Convent of the Sacred Heart in New York City. In 1896 Katharine visited her brothers in

Helena, Montana Helena (; ) is the capital city of Montana, United States, and the county seat of Lewis and Clark County. Helena was founded as a gold camp during the Montana gold rush, and established on October 30, 1864. Due to the gold rush, Helena would ...

, where she met and married William Gibbs, a

Protestant Protestantism is a Christian denomination, branch of Christianity that follows the theological tenets of the Reformation, Protestant Reformation, a movement that began seeking to reform the Catholic Church from within in the 16th century agai ...

watchmaker A watchmaker is an artisan who makes and repairs watches. Since a majority of watches are now factory-made, most modern watchmakers only repair watches. However, originally they were master craftsmen who built watches, including all their par ...

originally from

Medford, Massachusetts Medford is a city northwest of downtown Boston on the Mystic River in Middlesex County, Massachusetts, United States. At the time of the 2020 U.S. Census, Medford's population was 59,659. It is home to Tufts University, which has its campus alo ...

. The couple eventually settled in

Providence, Rhode Island Providence is the capital and most populous city of the U.S. state of Rhode Island. One of the oldest cities in New England, it was founded in 1636 by Roger Williams, a Reformed Baptist theologian and religious exile from the Massachusetts Bay ...

and had two sons before her husband died in 1909 in a boating accident at the Edgewood Yacht Club in

Cranston, Rhode Island Cranston, once known as Pawtuxet, is a city in Providence County, Rhode Island. The official population of the city in the 2020 United States Census was 82,934, making it the second largest in the state. The center of population of Rhode Island i ...

near their home. In 1910 Gibbs' sister, Mary Ryan, enrolled in the Providence School for Secretaries in Providence, Rhode Island and became an assistant teacher at the school. The school's owner asked Mary if she would like to purchase the school, and Mary and Katharine decided to purchase it together for $1,000 with Mary teaching and Katharine serving as an administrator. They changed the curriculum to focus on secretarial training rather than

stenography Shorthand is an abbreviated symbolic writing method that increases speed and brevity of writing as compared to longhand, a more common method of writing a language. The process of writing in shorthand is called stenography, from the Greek ''ste ...

and experienced great expansion at the time of

World War I World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fightin ...

when many men left jobs to fight in the War. Gibbs expanded the schools to create a branch near every major

Ivy League The Ivy League is an American collegiate athletic conference comprising eight private research universities in the Northeastern United States. The term ''Ivy League'' is typically used beyond the sports context to refer to the eight schools ...

university, expanding to Boston by 1917 and to New York by 1918. After her death, Katharine's youngest son, Gordon Gibbs, served as President and expanded the school to other cities. Gibbs was inducted into the

Rhode Island Heritage Hall of Fame The Rhode Island Heritage Hall of Fame was established in the State of Rhode Island in 1965. Its mission statement states that the Rhode Island Heritage Hall of Fame "exists to honor and recognize, and to extol and publicize the achievements of th ...

in 1983.

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Further reading