Carole Keeton Strayhorn
American politician
Carole Stewart Keeton (September 13, 1939 – March 26, 2025), formerly known as Carole Keeton McClellan, Carole Keeton Rylander and Carole Keeton Strayhorn, was an American politician who served as the 49th mayor of Austin from 1977 to 1983 and as the Texas comptroller of public accounts from 1999 to 2007.
Elected to the comptroller's post in 1998 as a Republican, Keeton ran as an independent candidate for Texas governor against Republican incumbent Rick Perry in 2006. She lost the November general election to Perry and placed third in a six-way race, with 18 percent.
Keeton was notable for several firsts in Austin and Texas politics. She was the first and so far, only woman elected as Mayor of Austin and the first Austin mayor elected to three consecutive terms. She was the first woman elected to the Texas Railroad Commission and the first woman elected as comptroller. She also was the first woman to serve as president of the Austin school board and as president of the Austin Community College board.
In May 2009, Keeton lost her campaign for Mayor of Austin.
Background
Keeton was born Carole Stewart Keeton in Austin, the second child and only daughter of Madge Anna (Stewart) and W. Page Keeton, a lawyer and university dean. She attended the University of Texas at Austin, where she was a member of the Orange Jackets, a women's honorary service organization.
The public source identifies “Carole Keeton Strayhorn” as american politician. This brief keeps that definition visible, then builds a research path around Carole, Keeton and Strayhorn.
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Biographical claims are most persuasive when dates, appointments and relationships can be traced to records created close to the events described. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 13, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q5044694. 1 of 1 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1939, 2025, 1977 and 1983.
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This entry incorporates text from “Carole Keeton Strayhorn” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.