Biography

Olga Alfreda Samuelson Freeman was born in Osceola, Nebraska, in 1903. Her family moved to Colton, Oregon, in 1910. She majored in business at Oregon State University. After graduating, she taught mathematics and commercial subjects at high schools in Oregon and California. She attended the University of Washington during her summers and earned a master’s degree. She then took a teaching job in Vancouver, Washington. Two years later, she and Neil Freeman were married. In 1937, the couple relocated to Eugene, Oregon, where Neil Freeman worked for the Farmer’s Home Administration. She worked as a substitute teacher in Eugene for about four years before being hired as a professor of mathematics at the University of Oregon in 1943. She taught there until 1949. She was elected Democratic precinct committee chair for many years before attempting a run for the Oregon Legislature in 1952. After her loss, she was elected Lane County treasurer. She then served as Lane County clerk from 1960 to 1964. She continued to be active in the Democratic Party, as well as working as a freelance writer. She died in 1997.

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