KARIN LARSON: Breaking Barriers for Inclusion

by Tena Yatroussis, Senior Director for Development

As a young woman, Karin Larson had big plans. While her mother and father did manual labor to earn a living, she was determined to have a professional career. Although no one in her family had ever been out of the United States, Karin graduated in 1963 with a degree in international relations and business from the University of Minnesota’s University College and a plan to go into the foreign service

“It’s the great American dream story,” said Larson in a 2005 interview with Minnesota Public Radio “My father worked in a warehouse and my mother worked in a laundry. I was the first college graduate in my family. I've been so fortunate, blessed really.”

Breaking Barriers

Karin spent her career in the financial services industry working for the Capital Group. With a gift for numbers she rose through the ranks from secretary, to statistician, to the first female research director, to chair of Capital International Research, Inc. No small feat for a woman in the 1970’s.