January 2, 1857

Martha Carey Thomas  (January 2, 1857  to  December 2, 1935) was an educator,. She became the second president of Bryn Mawr. and gained fame for the rigorous standards she put in place for the education of women there. This despite the fact she herself presented as original work of her own, research and writing which others had actually done. This is according to Rodger Streitmatter. He includes Carey Thomas, as she preferred to be called, in his recent Outlaw Marriages: The Hidden Histories of Fifteen Extraordinary Same-Sex Couples, (2012).

In this book we learn that the president of Bryn Mawr, was part of a devoted partnership with another woman. The relationship lasted decades but ended in acrimony. The partner was Mamie Gwinn, on the faculty at the school. She would later write of Thomas that, "She was created, so it seems to me in retrospect, as being as incapable of altruistic feeling as my cat is."

Carey Thomas came from a Quaker background and counted a number of notable relatives. One of her cousins was the noted critic Logan Pearsall Smith. Another, Alys Pearsall Smith was married to Bertrand Russell.