The Phi Delta Delta Women’s Legal Fraternity hosted a convention in the summer of 1926 in Colorado.
The Rocky Mountain News reported the event happened in Estes Park. The Estes Park Trail noted the event featured “women lawyers — judges, attorneys general, police court justices, public defenders, state prosecutors, solicitors, state senators, legal editors, and just plain lawyers.”
The Rocky Mountain News explained it was the fourth biennial convention of the group as Mabel Walker Willebrandt, national president of the organization, and others were “given a cordial welcome to Estes Park by Stephen T. Mather, national director of parks, who deserted the party of the crown prince and princess of Sweden to greet the modern Portias.”
The prince and princess had been visiting the West The Rocky Mountain News reported. The Estes Park Trail indicated the royalty were touring national parks and Mather attended their visit.
The Rocky Mountain News noted then Wyoming Gov. Nellie Tayloe Ross declined an invitation to address the convention as she previously accepted an invitation to speak at the University of Wyoming. Ross was the first woman to serve as governor of a state, according to the National Governors Association.
A blog from the National Archives added Willebrandt was the first female public defender for Los Angeles and was later appointed assistant U.S. Attorney General, under both President Warren Harding’s and President Calvin Coolidge’s administrations. The Rocky Mountain News reported Willebrandt, in her position with the federal government, helped with the enforcement of prohibition, among other things.
In 1972, Phi Delta Delta members became members of the Phi Alpha Delta Law Fraternity, International through a merger agreement, according to Phi Alpha Delta’s website.