Jane Grey Cannon Swisshelm was born in Pennsylvania, and moved to St. Cloud, Minnesota in 1857 with her daughter. Already a known journalist in her home state, Swisshelm became editor of the St. Cloud Visiter newspaper. Her outspoken views promoting women's rights, the abolition of slavery, and the Republican Party caused trouble for her with the Democratic owner of the newspaper. Swisshelm also expressed negative perspectives about American Indians, promoting their complete explusion from Minnesota. When she traveled to Washington, D.C., to lobby for harsher treatment of the Dakota, she took a job there, never to permanently return to Minnesota.