Rose Mofford
first woman Governor and the first woman Secretary of State
Rose Mofford (née Perica; June 10, 1922 – September 15, 2016) was an American civil servant and politician of the Democratic Party who served as the 18th governor of Arizona from 1988 to 1991. Her career in state government spanned 51 years, beginning as a secretary and working her way up the ranks to become the state's first female secretary of state, serving from 1977 to 1988, and the state's first female governor.
Early life
Mofford was born Rose Perica in Globe, Arizona, on June 10, 1922, the youngest of six children. Her parents, Frances (Oberstar) and John Perica, had immigrated to the United States from Croatia, then part of Austria-Hungary. The first female class president in the history of Globe High School, she had success in both academics and athletics. She played basketball and was an All-American softball player.
She graduated in 1939 as class valedictorian and, based upon her father's advice, turned down an opportunity to play professional basketball with the All American Red Heads.
Career
Following high school, Mofford began her career as an administrative assistant for State Treasurer Joe Hunt. She was eighteen when she started working for him, and earned a salary of $125 a month. Two years later, when Hunt was promoted to the Arizona Tax Commission, Mofford followed her boss to the new position.
“Rose Mofford” enters the record as first woman Governor and the first woman Secretary of State. Crown Archives preserves that source wording while asking what Rose, Mofford and first can confirm, complicate or overturn.
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Named sources, stable identifiers and responsible institutions provide the strongest route from overview to verifiable evidence. The source revision retrieved here is dated Aug 11, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q291749. VIAF identifies the subject as 57875249. The Library of Congress control number is n78068630. 3 of 3 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1922, 2016, 1988 and 1991.
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This entry incorporates text from “Rose Mofford” 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.