Dr. Ida Catherine Bender died on June 11, 1916. Dr. Bender was born in 1858 into an influential family in Buffalo's German-American community. Her father, Philip Bender, was a state Assemblyman and owner of the Telegraph, a German newspaper in the city. Dr. Bender spent her life pursuing academic excellence. As a student was awarded the Jesse Ketchum Award Gold Medal for excellence in academics. She would later become a teacher of Latin, German, French, and English. She became superintendent of Buffalo public schools for the primary grades, and she was credited with modernizing the schools. She wrote textbooks, too, and served as president of the Women Teachers' Association. Dr. Bender earned a medical degree from the Buffalo Medical School -- a rare accomplishment for a woman at the time -- in 1890. A sure injustice of the times is that Dr. Ida Bender was not only a teacher but also a doctor and she could still not vote. Dr. Bender, who never married, lived on Parkside Avenue. She was praised in a city newspaper at her death in 1916 as "a woman with high ideals and broad appreciation, one who built for the future -- a woman with a vision." Dr. Ida Bender is buried in section O in Forest Lawn.