What was Georgia O'Keeffe's first major teaching position, begun in 1916?

Georgia O'Keeffe's first major teaching position, begun in 1916, was at West Texas State Normal College.

O'Keeffe joined the faculty of West Texas State Normal College in Canyon, Texas, in 1916. The institution later became West Texas State University and is now West Texas A&M University. She taught art there until 1918, while developing the abstract drawings that first attracted Alfred Stieglitz's attention.

The Texas Panhandle also gave O'Keeffe visual material that later appeared in her work. She experienced the region's broad skies, canyons, and distinctive light, although her best-known New Mexico imagery came from a different part of the Southwest. Her teaching career was important because it supported her financially while she established herself as an artist.

This appointment is sometimes confused with her earlier teaching in South Carolina and Virginia. O'Keeffe had taught before 1916, but Canyon was the location of the major position that connected her teaching, emerging abstraction, and later move toward professional recognition.