McClure, Florence
Description
Florence McClure worked on behalf of women in Las Vegas, co-founding the organization Community Action Against Rape (CAAR) and advocating for incarcerated women. Born Florence Alberta Schilling in Centralia, Illinois on September 26, 1919, she attended MacMurray College for Women before transferring to Hardin Business College where she graduated in October 1941.
During World War II, she worked a series of jobs for the government supporting the US war effort. She met her husband, James McClure, a US Air Force officer, while working for the Security and Intelligence Division in Miami, Florida. The couple had two children, James and Carolyn.
Following her husband’s retirement from the air force, the family moved to California and then to Las Vegas, Nevada. McClure began working as an assistant to Burton Cohen at the New Frontier Hotel and Casino. She later worked at the Desert Inn and as an office manager for Howard Hughes.
McClure joined women’s organizations including the League of Women Voters and the Soroptimists. She also enrolled at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas (UNLV) and earned her bachelor’s degree in sociology in 1971. She and Sandi Petta founded the Community Action Against Rape (CAAR) in 1973, in an effort to advocate for victims, including sensitivity training for police and medical professionals and funding for rape test kits.
After retiring from CAAR in 1984, McClure devoted her efforts to helping incarcerated women maintain ties with their children and to navigate the Nevada prison system. She lobbied the state to locate the women’s prison near Las Vegas so the women imprisoned there would still be able to have their children visit. In April 2007 the Nevada State Senate passed a bill to rename the Southern Nevada Women's Correctional Facility as the Florence McClure Women's Correctional Center. McClure passed away in 2009.
Sources:
Moor, Angela. “Florence McClure.”
Blasky, Mike. "McClure, activist for women's rights, dies."
