Introduction

Biography

Kate was the daugh­ter of Pe­ter Han­sen and Al­pha Ama Gray.

She gra­du­at­ed from high school in Bel­oit, Kan­sas, in 1896. Af­ter earn­ing a teach­ing li­cense, her first po­si­tion was at a rur­al school just east of Mar­vin, Kan­sas, in 1896. From 1896–97, she taught and served as as­sist­ant prin­ci­pal of the grade school in Lo­gan.

In 1899, she moved to Law­rence, Kan­sas, to at­tend the Uni­ver­si­ty of Kan­sas (KU). After earn­ing a mu­sic teach­er’s cer­ti­fi­cate in 1901, she took a teach­ing job in the Den­ver, Co­lo­ra­do, pub­lic schools, where she taught both mu­sic and Ger­man. She re­turned to KU in 1902, gra­du­at­ing with a Ba­che­lor of Arts de­gree in 1905.

Hansen was ac­tive in re­li­gious or­ga­ni­za­tions, par­ti­cu­lar­ly the Young Wo­men’s Chris­tian As­so­cia­tion. In Feb­ru­ary 1905, she was award­ed a Phi Be­ta Kap­pa key.

After gra­du­at­ing, she re­turned to Den­ver to teach, un­til she qua­li­fied as a mis­sion­ary teach­er. Han­sen and her friend and col­lege class­mate, Lydia Lind­sey, were ap­point­ed by the Re­formed Church in the Unit­ed States to teach at a girls’ school in Ja­pan.

They left Am­eri­ca in 1907 for the Mi­ya­gi Girls’ School in Sen­dai, Ja­pan, 200 miles north of To­kyo. They would be con­nect­ed to this school for 45 years, help­ing it grow from a high school in­to a ful­ly ac­cred­it­ed li­ber­al arts col­lege and mu­sic con­ser­va­to­ry.

Hansen re­turned to KU in 1912, and re­ceived her Ba­che­lor of Mu­sic de­gree in 1913. Back in Ja­pan, she or­gan­ized a con­ser­va­to­ry course in mu­sic, and served as Dean of that de­part­ment un­til re­tire­ment.

She was al­so act­ing pre­si­dent of Mi­ya­gi Col­lege in 1916–18, 1925–26, and 1934–35. In 1926, she en­tered the gra­du­ate school of the Chi­ca­go Mu­sic­al Col­lege and re­ceived her Mas­ters of Mu­sic with hon­ors in 1927.

In 1941, both Han­sen and Lind­sey re­turned to Am­eri­ca on the last boat to reach a U. S. port before the at­tack on Pearl Har­bor. Dur­ing World War II, Han­sen lec­tured and re­searched in the U.S.

In 1947, she and Lind­sey re­turned to Ja­pan to con­tin­ue teach­ing at the Mi­ya­gi Con­ser­va­to­ry. In the post-war pe­ri­od, Han­sen spent much time in re­lief and re­con­struct­ion work. Mi­ya­gi Col­lege had lost se­ven build­ings in the Am­eri­can bom­bing of Sen­dai.

Hansen and Lind­sey were hon­ored in 1951 when the Em­per­or of Japan con­ferred on each of them a ci­ta­tion and the Fourth Order of the Sac­red Trea­sure for out­stand­ing work in wo­men’s edu­ca­tion.

In 1955, KU and the KU Alum­ni As­so­cia­tion hon­ored each of them with a Ci­ta­tion of Dis­tin­guished Ser­vice. In 1951, they re­turned to Lo­gan, Kan­sas, where Han­sen lived the rest of her life.