Salomé Ureña was a 19th-century Dominican poet and an early proponent of women's higher education in the Dominican Republic. She was the daughter of writer, Gregoria Díaz de León, who provided her with an early education. At a young age, Salomé was well influenced by literature. Her father, Nicolás Ureña de Mendoza, taught her the classic works of Spanish and French writers that helped the young Salomé to develop her, own literary career. She began writing verses at the age of fifteen, later publishing her first works at the age of seventeen, with a characteristic imprint of spontaneity and tenderness. Salomé quickly gained recognition in the Dominican Republic for her patriotic and lyric verses. In 1867 she published her first works under the pseudonym "Herminia", a name she used until 1874. In 1874, at the age of 23, Salomé participated in the publication of an anthology of contemporary poets. "La Lira de Quisqueya", a work that was circulated about the first anniversary of the overthrow of the despotic government of Buenaventura Báez and in which seven poems by Salomé were included: The Glory of Progress, Remembrance of a Proscript, Melancholy, Answer, My Homeland, Gratitude, and A Hymn. In 1880, at the age of twenty-nine, she married the doctor and writer Francisco Henríquez y Carvajal, a politician who achieved the presidency of the Dominican Republic. She had four children with him: Francisco, Pedro, Max, and Camila; who would later become highly respected figures of contemporary literature of the mid-and late twentieth century as writers, philosophers, poets, humanists and art critics. Around 1881, Salomé with the help of her husband opened one of the first centers of higher education for young women in the Dominican Republic, which she named "Instituto de Señoritas". Within five years, the first six female teachers had graduated from the Institute, something uncommon at the time. Salomé is not only among the most highly regarded poets in Dominican literature, she may be the most famous woman in Dominican history!

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