[3] President Lyndon Johnson credited Meyer for building public support for the Elementary and Secondary Education Act of 1965, which for the first time directed federal assistance towards school districts that served children from low-income families.

[8] Meyer was born on January 2, 1887, in New York City to Frederic and Lucy Ernst, who were first-generation German Lutheran immigrants.

[3] then continued her studies at the Sorbonne in 1908–09, where she encountered Edward Steichen, Auguste Rodin, Constantin Brâncuși, and Gertrude and Leo Stein.

[1][9] In 1908, Ernst met her future husband Eugene Meyer, who was 11 years her senior, in an art gallery in New York City.

[13] In 1915–1916, she created and published the literary art magazine 291 with Alfred Stieglitz, Marius de Zayas, and Paul Haviland.

[8] Its second issue featured a full-page printed version of Mental Reactions, the earliest example of visual poetry in America, in which Meyer's poem is cut into individually trimmed blocks of pasted-down text and strewn across the page.

[8] Her husband Eugene Meyer, after resigning as Chairman of the Federal Reserve in 1933, purchased the bankrupt Washington Post, to which Agnes frequently contributed articles about the problems of veterans, migrant workers, overcrowded schools, and African Americans.

She spoke at the convention of the American Association of School Administrators in Atlantic City, New Jersey, calling his behavior an affront to the dignity of a free people.

[5] Speaking at the Barnard Forum, Meyer argued that "security is not an aim in itself," that without freedom it "reduces life to that of the prison.

"[18] Her gender politics were more traditionalist and typical of the decade, however, seen when she wrote an article for the Atlantic Monthly in which she asserted "Women have many careers but only one vocation – motherhood.

[2] President Lyndon Johnson credited Meyer for building public support for the Elementary and Secondary Education Act of 1965, which for the first time directed federal assistance towards school districts that served children from low-income families.

[3][14] On November 17, 1956, Agnes E. Meyer addressed the National Council of Negro Women in Washington D.C.[1] Throughout the 1960s she continued to dedicate her time to improving public education through the creation and financial support of several not-for profit organizations.

[1][3] In 1944, with her husband she created the Eugene and Agnes E. Meyer Foundation to provide funding for civic activities, particularly those related to improving public education.

[3] The next year, she founded the Urban Service Corps a program to offer mentoring to school children in Washington D.C.

[20] The Meyer family contributed paintings by Paul Cézanne and Édouard Manet, sculptures by Constantin Brâncuși, and watercolors by John Marin to the National Gallery of Art.

[33] The Library of Congress holds the Agnes Elizabeth Ernst Meyer Papers which includes her diaries, correspondence with family, friends, and her career as an author and social activist, her speeches, and an unpublished manuscript for a memoir.