CACrown ArchivesThe cinema collection
Menu
Research dossier · People & Ideas

Jennifer Dunn

American politician (1941-2007)

Correspondence, annotated notebooks and portrait silhouettes prepared for research
People and ideasInterpretive dossier study · Crown Archives visual atlas
Record originEnglish Wikipedia
Text licenseCC BY-SA 4.0
Source revisionAug 29, 2026
Entity authorityQ518997 ↗
Source-derived summary

Jennifer Jill Dunn (née Blackburn; July 29, 1941 – September 5, 2007) was an American politician and engineer who served six terms as a Republican member of the United States House of Representatives from 1993 to 2005, representing Washington's 8th congressional district.

Early life and education

Born in Seattle, Washington, Dunn grew up in the nearby city of Bellevue, and graduated from Bellevue High School in 1959. She attended the University of Washington, where she was a member of Gamma Phi Beta sorority, before earning a Bachelor of Arts from Stanford University. After graduation, she worked as a systems engineer. She was a distant cousin of congressman Slade Gorton.

Political career

Dunn was chair of the Washington State Republican Party from 1981 to 1992 and twice a delegate to the United Nations Commission on the Status of Women (1984 and 1990).

In 1992, she ran for an open seat in the House, winning 60 percent of the vote. She was Washington's only Republican representative until the Republican Revolution of 1994 when Republicans swept all but two of Washington's nine House seats. In 1998, she became the first woman ever to run for the position of House Majority Leader.

Dunn served as vice-chair of the Select Committee on Homeland Security and served on the House Ways and Means Committee and the Joint Economic Committee.

Editorial summary

“Jennifer Dunn” enters the record as american politician (1941-2007). Crown Archives preserves that source wording while asking what Jennifer, Dunn and American can confirm, complicate or overturn.

Editorial reviewA useful biographical orientation record, particularly for establishing names, roles and a first chronology. The current lead gives the account dated anchors—1941, 2007, 1993, 2005—that can be checked directly. The linked authority record independently contributes the date 1941-07-29. Its strongest next move is a source search built around Jennifer, Dunn and American.
Editorial analysis

Why this record matters

“Jennifer Dunn” is worth following because a concise public description often conceals a longer documentary argument. Here, Jennifer, Dunn and American provides the most credible route into that argument.

Evidence profile

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 Aug 29, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q518997. VIAF identifies the subject as 259528208. The Library of Congress control number is no2012103697. 3 of 3 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1941, 2007, 1993 and 2005.

Critical limits

A concise life account rarely captures disputed attribution, private networks or the changing language used to describe a career. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.

How to read it

Read biographical claims against dates, named institutions and the cited references. Distinguish a subject’s later reputation from evidence produced during their lifetime.

Best used for
  • Establishing names and roles
  • Building a first chronology
  • Locating cited institutions
Verify next

Personal papers, civil or court records, institutional files and the scholarship cited by the source.

Three-step research path

  1. Establish the record: confirm the title “Jennifer Dunn”, its source revision and the description used here.
  2. Expand the search: follow Jennifer Dunn primary sources, Jennifer Dunn archive and Jennifer research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
  3. Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.

Questions for further research

  1. Which source most directly establishes the central claim about “Jennifer Dunn”?
  2. Which primary records establish identity, chronology and institutional ties?
  3. Which claims depend on a single source or contested interpretation?
Subject index

Search terms from this dossier

Source & attribution

This entry incorporates text from “Jennifer Dunn” 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.