Jeanette is the French diminutive of Jeanne — from the Hebrew *Yochanan* ("God is gracious"). **A top-100 US baby name from 1917 to 1937**. **Jeannette Rankin (1880-1973)** — **American politician; the first woman ever elected to the United States Congress (R-Montana, 1917), three years before the 19th Amendment gave most American women the right to vote**. **A lifelong pacifist; the only member of Congress to vote against US entry into both World War I (1917) and World War II (1941) — the latter vote was 388-1**. **Co-founded the National American Woman Suffrage Association**; led the 1968 Jeannette Rankin Brigade march on Washington against the Vietnam War at age 87. **Jeanette MacDonald (1903-1965)** — American soprano and actress; eight Oscar-nominated musical films with Nelson Eddy (1935-1942). **Jeanette Winterson (born 1959)** — British author; *Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit* (1985), *Why Be Happy When You Could Be Normal?* (2011); OBE. **Jeanette Lee** — "The Black Widow" pool champion. **Jeanette Bouvier** — Jackie Kennedy's middle name was Bouvier.
Featured throughout 20th-century American history.
Jeanette reduces to four — the number of US Congress first.