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Carrie Koeturius was born to Josephine and George Koeturius in 1949-1950. After the early deaths of her parents, Koeturius was raised by aunts in the New Jersey area. She graduated from Penns Grove High School in Penns Grove, New Jersey, in 1966. She then attended Potomac State College in Keyser, West Virginia, for several years before dropping out her senior year.
She worked in several local Morgantown businesses before gaining employment as a secretary in the WVU 4-H state office as part of the Cooperative Extension Service. While working with the 4-H, she served as an assistant to director Mildred Fizer. She then returned to school and earned a degree in social work through WVU's Board of Regents Bachelor of Arts (BA) program in 1979.
While working on her degree at WVU, she participated in a work-study internship with the Rape and Domestic Violence Information Center (RDVIC) in Morgantown. She went on to work briefly as their administrative assistant before federal funding ran out.
She then began working as a manager in the WVU Conference Center, where she organized freshman orientation, summer camps, and campus programs. While working at the WVU Conference Center, Koeturius served on the steering committee for WVU's Focus on Women and Health conference in 1982 and served as co-chair for WVU's Women and Creativity: Masks, Myths, and Marmalade conference in 1984.
While serving on the steering committee for the Focus on Women in Health conference in 1981, she was inspired to encourage women singer-songwriters to perform in Morgantown. She facilitated the visit of artist Holly Near and helped found the Artemis Sisters, a group of feminist women in Morgantown who sought to bring female artists to Morgantown.
While living in Morgantown, Koeturius was also active with the WVU Council for Women's Concerns, Parents Anonymous, Parents and Children Together, Stop Abuse Against Womyn, Women's Information Center, and the defense committees for Lorraine Momen and Elizabeth Strickland. In 1982 she also helped organize Sisterspace, a feminist lending library and space for women in Morgantown, donating 200 of her own personal books.
In 1984, she received WVU's Mary Catherine Buswell Award and the Morgantown Soroptimist's Women Helping Women Award. Before moving away from Morgantown permanently in 1985, the WVU Center for Women's Studies established a scholarship in her name, which as of 2026 May, still exists.
After leaving Morgantown, Koeturius lived in California and founded CK & Associates in 1990. She returnedto WVU to participate in the Women and Creativity: Masks, Myths, and Marmalade conference in 1994. As of 2026 May, she is retired and lives in Tennessee.
[Description and date of item], [Box/folder number], Carrie Koeturius Papers, A&M 4356, West Virginia and Regional History Center, West Virginia University Libraries, Morgantown, West Virginia.
An oral history with Carrie Koeturius and other materials related to the Artemis Sisters are available in A&M 4561
This collection contains materials collected and created by Carrie Koeturius during her time as an activist in Morgantown, West Virginia. It includes materials related to activist and advocacy organizations such as the Artemis Sisters, Sisterspace, and Women's Information Center. It also contains materials related to her activities at WVU concerning the Women and Creativity conferences in 1984 and 1998 and personal achievements, such as her receiving the Mary Catherine Buwell Award and Women Helping Women Award.
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