Catharine Van Valkenburg Waite (30 January 1829, Dumfries, Ontario, Canada – 9 November 1913, Chicago, Illinois) was an American writer, lawyer, businesswoman, and women's suffrage activist.

Born in British North America, Van Valkenburg moved with her family to Denmark, Iowa Territory at age 17.

The Waite family relocated to the Great Salt Lake Valley in 1862 after her husband Charles was appointed as an associate justice of the Supreme Court of Utah Territory by President Lincoln.

[2] Two years later, as part of a national effort by suffragists to test the newly adopted Fifteenth Amendment, she appeared at the polls to vote and was turned away.

[4] Along with a number of other Chicago women leaders, Waite was involved in the planning of the World's Columbian Exposition in 1893.

She died of heart disease of 9 November 1913 while visiting her daughter Lucy's home in Park Ridge, Illinois.