Victoria Schuck earned her Ph.D. in political science from Stanford University in 1937—one of the first 25 women with Ph.D.'s who were members of APSA and one of the first 80 or so women to earn a Ph.D. in political science at all. She was a scholar, a teacher, and a leader. Her scholarship was lively, practical,and immediately relevant, as was everything she did. Her dissertation topic was “Government in California: Its Development and Present Aspects,” and subsequent studies were “The Massachusetts Governership: Hamstrung by History,” “Introduction to Party Politics in the New England States,” and “Women in Political Science: Some Preliminary Observations.”

Schuck thrived in the Mount Holyoke College political science department for many years, bringing her students to Washington with regularity and pioneering the concept of the Washington internship program (and also zipping about town in a little Porsche roadster). She motivated generations of women to enter politics and political science. She put her own hand into Washington practice as well, with a term at the U.S. Office of Price Administration during World War II and service on innumerable boards and commissions for the United Nations, for the Presidents Commission on Registration and Voting Participation (in 1963), for the state of Massachusetts, and around the world.

Vicky Schuck was also an institution builder. She led the formation of the New England Political Science Association, and served as its president in 1950, was secretary of APSA in 1960, and was there in those remarkable breakout years in political science in 1969 at the emergence of the Women's Caucus, and as a member of the newly formed APSA Committee on the Status of Women in 1971. In 1981–83, she served as president of Mount Vernon College in Washington, DC. She later spent time at the Woodrow Wilson Center for International Scholars and Stanford University. She died in 1999 at the age of eightynine.

This puckish portrait is one token to remind us of Victoria Shuck's spirit and of her contributions to our lives and our field. We have even greater remembrances. Through her initial contribution, and the generosity of many other political scientists, in 1987 APSA established the Victoria Schuck Prize for the best book on women and politics. The existence of this prize has shone a spotlight on a body of scholarship by men and women sharing Victoria Schuck's passion for civic and political life.

APSA Executive Director Michael A. Brintnall, former executive director Catherine E. Rudder, and former Mount Vernon College trustee and former APSA assistant director Walter E. Beach at the dedication of the presidential portrait of Victoria Schuck on the campus of Mount Vernon College at George Washington University, Washington DC, October 11, 2002.

Victoria Shuck has left us a generation of scholars and activists who were touched by her energy and commitment. This was evident in the testimonials at the portrait unveiling. Astrid Merget, upon assuming the Deanship at the School of Public and Environmental Affairs at Indiana University, looked back to Vicky's mentorship: Vicky Schuck “was larger than life in her ambitions for her students… She encouraged us to become immersed in politics, to run for electoral office, to have a strong civic sense, and to take political activity very seriously.”