Harriet Bishop
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| Born | Harriet Bishop January 1, 1817 Panton, Vermont, United States |
| Died | August 8, 1883 (aged 66) Saint Paul, Minnesota, U.S. |
| Occupation | Teacher, writer, activist |
| Alma mater | New York State Normal School |
| Genre | Naturalism, History |
| Subject | Minnesota |
| Notable works | Floral Home; or, First Years of Minnesota, Published 1857, New York |
| Spouse | John McConkey |
Harriet E. Bishop (January 1, 1817 – August 8, 1883) was an American educator, writer, suffragist, and temperance activist. Born in Panton, Vermont, she moved to Saint Paul, Minnesota in 1847. There she started the first public school in the Minnesota Territory, the first Sunday school in the territory, was a founding member of temperance, suffrage and civic organizations, played a central role in establishing the First Baptist Church of Saint Paul, and was an active promoter of her adopted state.
Harriet Bishop received her teacher training at the Fort Edward Institute, and the New York State Normal School in Albany, New York under the instruction of renowned educator Catherine Beecher of Boston, Massachusetts. She spent about the first decade of her career teaching in Essex, New York.
Given the growing demand for teachers on the expanding frontier, and the limited number of opportunities in New England for young women to find teaching positions, the newly formed Board of National Popular Education in Cleveland, Ohio developed a program that encouraged young women teachers to move to the western territories to found schools. When news came of an opportunity in the Minnesota Territory, Harriet Bishop was eager to pursue it as an exciting adventure. Of the protests and arguments her family and friends made against her decision, she later wrote that they "were to me as so many incentives for me to persist in my decision." Her inspiration for adventure was partly influenced by reading the memoirs of Baptist missionaries Harriet Newell and Ann Judson during their missions in Burma.
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