Eminent Homemaker
County: Yankton
Sorenson was born in Yankton County. She graduated from the eighth grade, attended Normal School for two years, then went to business school. For four years Sorenson taught in rural schools and for three years she taught in business school at Dakota Wesleyan in Mitchell.
The Sorensons operated a 160-acre farm in Yankton County until 1946 when they moved to Yakima, Washington and moved three years later to Sherman Oaks, California.
Sorenson helped organize the first South Dakota Guild of Eminent Homemakers in 1928. She also attended the first meeting of the National Guild at Ames, Iowa, and became a charter member of that organization.
For 10 years, she served as county chairman of Extension Clubs in Yankton County and did much to further Extension Club work throughout the state.
Sorenson has always taken an active interest in state and national politics. In the fall of 1928 she aided The National Speakers’ Bureau of the Republican Party in the presidential campaign by giving several addresses over the air. She was also a candidate for the state legislature.
In 1934, South Dakota State College asked Sorenson to represent the rural women of South Dakota on the Farm and Home Hour over the NBC network.
Sorenson was a member of the Elm Grove school board. She was a member of the Lutheran church, superintendent of the County Sunday School Association, delegate to the State Sunday School Convention and teacher in the local Sunday school. She served on the Yankton County Red Cross Committee and on the Rural House Survey, taking the census in several townships in Yankton County.
Much of Sorenson’s leisure time was spent in taking part in and directing plays and pageants for the Community Club of which she was program director. She also enjoyed writing articles for women’s magazines and wrote a homemaker’s column for the local weekly paper.