Corina Rodríguez López

Corina Rodríguez López (1895–1982) was a Costa Rican educator, writer, feminist and occasional sculptor. She was the founder of the Casa del Niño and the Temperance League of Costa Rica, as well as a feminist and suffragette. She was twice exiled for her outspokenness on the treatment of women and children and her political views. She taught school in both Costa Rica and Panama and wrote articles for newspapers and magazines criticizing both national and international political policies. When she returned from exile in Panama, she worked as a housing advocate for poor families in the southern neighborhoods of San José. She was inducted into the Costa Rican Gallery of Women in 2007.

Biography Corina Rodríguez López was born on 25 December 1895 in San Ramón, Alajuela Province, Costa Rica to Joaquín Rodríguez Rodríguez and Juana López Castro. Her primary schooling was completed at the Central Girls' School in San Ramon. graduating as a teacher. During the first administration of Ricardo Jiménez Oreamuno she founded the Casa del Niño (House of Children) and co-founded the Temperance League. She was a supporter of Alfredo González Flores and when he was ousted from office by a coup d'état she was sent into exile by the Tinoco dictatorship. She also directed the Biblical Institute and Rodríguez joined the organization. In 1948, during the Costa Rican Civil War, she was imprisoned in El Buen Pastor and exiled to Panama. She joined the feminist movement there and worked as a Spanish teacher in the Canal Zone and also taught English at the National Institute. While in Panama, she took advanced courses in ceramics and sculpture.

When she was able to return to Costa Rica in the first part of the 1970s, Rodríguez began working for the National Institute of Housing and Urbanism (INVU). Between 1970 and 1974, she worked in the southern neighborhoods of San José, fighting for proper housing for the poor and a neighborhood was later named in her honor there.

Rodríguez was married three times. Many of her writings were published under the name of Corina Rodriguez López de Cornick. She died on 8 November 1982 in San José, Costa Rica. In 2007, she was inducted into the Gallery of Women at the National Institute for Women.