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Cornelia Marvin Pierce was born on December 26, 1873, in Monticello, Iowa, the second born out of five children. She attended high school in Saint Paul, Minnesota before moving with her family to Tacoma, Washington. In 1893, she moved to Chicago and became a mother's helper for a Mrs. Porter. While in Chicago she studied French history and ancient drama at the University of Chicago. By 1894, she convinced her father to fund her going to the Library School at the Armour Institute of Technology which later became the University of Illinois in Urbana. Cornelia Marvin Pierce held a position as Librarian at the Scoville Institute of Oak Park, Illinois. In 1905, she moved to Salem Oregon to become the secretary of the newly formed Oregon Library Commission. She was appointed as the Oregon State Librarian in 1913 and stayed in the position until 1928 when she resigned to marry former Oregon Governor Walter M Pierce. She was appointed a member of the Oregon State Board of Higher Education in 1931. She passed on February 12, 1957.