Wearing an electric blue suit with scarlet lips and trademark gold earrings, lawyer, academic and women’s activist Quentin Bryce was sworn in today as Australia's first female governor general.

In a formal ceremony held at the Senate chamber in Canberra, the 65-year-old grandmother became the country's 25th Governor General, breaking a 107-year-long male stranglehold on the vice regal role.

Watched by her five grandchildren, she told the assembled dignitaries, including Prime Minister Kevin Rudd: "Australians, you have entrusted a great deal to me. I will honour your trust wholeheartedly."

Ms Bryce, who succeeds Major General Michael Jeffery in the role, has declared her appointment a "breakthrough" for Australian women and even Republicans have described it as enlightened.

While the role of Governor General is largely anachronistic, the very fact that a woman is in the job will turn the spotlight back on a role that has been largely invisible in recent years.

Republicans are also hoping that this Governor-General will be the last, although Mr Rudd - himself a Republican - has not yet outlined any plans to rekindle the debate. A 1999 referendum on a republic rejected the idea. “The most we hope for is that he might start a more spirited discussion of the republic issue during this term of government,” John Warhurst, deputy head of the Australian Republican Movement, said today.

A feminist who has used charisma rather than belligerence to get her way, Ms Bryce is a renowned trailblazer for women, and is highly respected for the way she made her name, especially in 1960s and '70s macho Australia.

Raised with her sisters in the small outback town of Ilfracombe in Queensland, she laid a trail of firsts before she turned 30.

She graduated from law school when she was pregnant with the first of her children with the architect, Michael Bryce. She was then the first woman to be admitted to the Queensland bar, and the first female law lecturer at the University of Queensland.

As a sex discrimination commissioner, she became a renowned champion of women's rights and, as governor of Queensland, she was known for her battles for the rights of women and of the indigenous people. Ms Bryce stepped down after five years in the Queensland post to take on the Governor General position.

Her friends talk of how she used her charm to placate the men who tried to block her rise. When she first entered the common room of Queensland's law faculty 40 years ago, one of her male colleagues - enraged at having a woman amongst them - greeted her : "Why aren't you at home with your five children, cooking dinner?" She silenced him with an icy smile.

"She was given a terrible time by those men in the law faculty," her long time friend Kay Saunders, director of the Brisbane Institute, recalls. "They were shocking - rude and sarcastic - but she never lowered herself to their level. She had a steely, pleasant demeanor."

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