Abigail Adams
First Lady-Wife to John AdamsMother to John Quincy Adams proponent of humane treatment and equal education for women,envisioned legal system that would protect women from unlimited power by their husbands.Notable influence on husband through her letter writing.
Jane Addams
Reformer and Founder of Hull-House: pioneer American settlement house. Known for: contribution to urban social service. Awarded Noble Peace Prize-1931
Madeline Albright
First woman to become United States Secretary of state. (appointed by Pres. Bill Clinton)
Lousia May Alcott
author of Little Women, was an advocate of abolition, women's rights, and temperance
Maya Angelou
poet, educator, historian, best-selling author, actress, playwright, civil-rights activist, producer and director.At 14,became San Francisco's first African-American female cable car conductor.Film: Georgia, Georgia. Her script, the first by an African American woman ever to be filmed, was nominated for a Pulitzer Prize.
Susan B. Anthony
activist, reformer, teacher, lecturerhelp founded the American Equal Rights Assoc. Key spokesperson for 19th century women's suffrage movement.1979, first woman to be depicted on U.S currency; Susan B. Anthony dollar
Josephine Baker
-1920s comic,sensual dancer/performer took Europe by storm. Famous for barely-there dresses and no-holds-barred dance routines.-"Black Venus," "Black Pearl" and "Creole Goddess." -World War II -performed for French troops,honorable correspondent for the French Resistance (undercover work smuggling secret messages in her music sheets) -sub-lieutenant in the Women's Auxiliary Air Force.-awarded Medal of the Resistance with Rosette & Chevalier of the Legion of Honor -adopted children of different ethnicities and religion= Rainbow tribe.
Florence "Pancho" Barnes
first woman to fly into the interior of Mexico-pioneered a new route for an airline-set several aviation records, establishing a new woman's speed record.-worked in movie industry as a stunt pilot and technical advisor.-Opened a guest ranch-Happy Bottom Riding Club near Edwards Air Force Base: Haven for test pilots & other aviation luminaries
Clara Barton
pioneer American teacher, nurse, and humanitarian. She is best remembered for organizing the American Red Cross.
Catherine Beecher
-pioneer in health and physical education for American girls and women. -developed a widely used system of calisthenics that was designed to make women's bodies stronger and healthier. -spoke out against the wearing of corsets, she believed were hazardous to internal organs, and wrote extensively about the benefits of good nutrition-found the Hartford Female Seminary in 1823.Believed women made good teachers.
Mary Bickerdyke
-American Civil War joined a field hospital at Ft Donelson and worked on the first hospital boat that collected wounded soldiers from Cairo, St. Louis and Louisville. -later became chief of nursing under the command of General Ulysses S. Grant.
Elizabeth Blackwell
first woman to graduate from medical school (Geneva Medical school in NY) -pioneer in educating women in medicine
Nellie Bly
pen name of American pioneer female journalist Elizabeth Jane Cochran. She remains notable for two feats: a record-breaking trip around the world in emulation of Jules Verne's character Phileas Fogg, and an exposé in which she faked insanity to study a mental institution from within. In addition to her writing, she was also an industrialist and charity worker.
Claire Booth-Luce
was an American playwright, editor, journalist, ambassador, socialite and U.S. Congresswoman, representing the state of Connecticut.
Rachel Carson
writing Silent Spring, motivating environmentalist movement of the late 60s and early 70s
Mary Ann Shadd Cary
writing about abolition and other political issues; second African American woman to graduate from law school
Mary Cassatt
one of very few women who were part of the French Impressionist movement in art, and the only American during the movement's productive years; she often painted women in ordinary tasks. Her help to Americans collecting Impressionist art helped bring that movement to America
Carrie Chapman Catt
suffrage movement leader, founder of the League of Women Voters
Lydia Maria Child
early American writer and activist, known for her fiction including imaginative depictions of Native American life, for her domestic advice books and for her anti-slavery writings.
Shirley Chisholm
pioneer black and woman politician; ran for President in 1972 with the slogan, "Unbought and Unbossed"; first black woman elected to Congress
Mary Terrell Church
early civil rights leader; women's rights advocate, founder of National Association of Colored Women, charter member of the NAACP
Angela Davis
radical black activist and philosopher, was arrested as a suspected conspirator in the abortive attempt to free George Jackson from a courtroom in Marin County, California, August 7, 1970. The guns used were registered in her name. Angela Davis was eventually acquitted of all charges, but was briefly on the FBI's most-wanted list as she fled from arrest.
Dorothea Dix
an activist who served in the Civil War as Superintendent of Female Nurses, also worked for reform of treatment for the mentally ill
Elizabeth Dole
former Republican senator from North Carolina, former Secretary of Transportation, and former candidate for president in 2000. wife of former U.S. Senator Bob Dole. She became the first female Secretary of Transportation in 1983 under Ronald Reagan; - 1989, George Bush (elder) made her Secretary of Labor.-1991 head of the American Red Cross, a job she held until 1998. -formed an exploratory committee to run for the presidency in 2000, but withdrew from the race on 20 October 1999.
Amelia Earhart
-first women to fly solo across the Atlantic. she disappeared on the last leg of her flight around the world.-Won Harmon trophy four times, Flying around world - took off from New Guinea, Search effort lasted two years and declared dead. some Theories: that she Crashed, Spy, Faked and changed name (Irene), Received medals from National G. Society and French Government.
Mary Baker Eddy
founder of Christian Science; author of "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures" and founder of the Pulitzer Prize winning newspaper "The Christian Science Monitor
Jocelyn Elders
American pediatrician and public health administrator. She was a vice admiral in the Public Health Service Commissioned Corps and the first African American appointed as Surgeon General of the United States. Elders is best known for her frank discussion of her views on controversial issues such as drug legalization and distributing contraception in schools.[1]. She was fired mid-term amidst controversy.
Geraldine Ferraro
first woman nominated as vice-presidential candidate by any major American party...
Charlotte Forten
Charlotte Forten was the first northern African-American schoolteacher to go south to teach former slaves.
Betty Friedan
key "second wave" feministauthor of The Feminine Mystique (1963) identifying the "problem that has no name" and the question of the educated housewife: "Is this all?"founder and first president of the National Organization for Women (NOW)proponent of the Equal Rights Amendmentcritic of introducing lesbian issues into the women's movement, using the term "lavender menace
Margaret Fuller
American journalist, critic, and women's rights advocate associated with the American transcendentalism movement. She was the first full-time American female book reviewer in journalism. Her book Woman in the Nineteenth Century is considered the first major feminist work in the United States.
Matilda Jocelyn Gage
prolific writer and editor, best known for her work on the first three volumes of A History of Woman Suffrage, with Stanton and Anthony, her book Woman Church and State, and her newspaper, The National Citizen and Ballot Box.
Charlotte Perkins Gilman
prominent American sociologist, novelist, writer of short stories, poetry, and nonfiction, and a lecturer for social reform. She was a utopian feminist during a time when her accomplishments were exceptional for women, and she served as a role model for future generations of feminists because of her unorthodox concepts and lifestyle. Her best remembered work today is her semi-autobiographical short story The Yellow Wallpaper which she wrote after a severe bout of postpartum psychosis.
Ruth Bader Ginsberg
Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States. Ginsburg was appointed by President Bill Clinton and took the oath of office on August 10, 1993. Generally, she votes with the liberal wing of the Court. She is the second female justice (after Sandra Day O'Connor) and the first Jewish female justice.
Ella Grasso
first woman in the U.S. elected as a state governor (Connecticut) in her own right - that is, not as a successor to her husband. She served in several other offices, including the U.S. Congress. She resigned for health reasons in 1980 during her second term, and died February 5, 1981.
Sarah & Angelina Grimke
Among the first women to act publicly in social reform movements, they received abuse and ridicule for their abolitionist activity. They both realized that women would have to create a safe space in the public arena to be effective reformers. They became early activists in the women's rights movement.
Sarah Josepha Hale
author of the nursery rhyme "Mary Had a Little Lamb". She famously campaigned for the creation of the American holiday known as Thanksgiving, and for the completion of the Bunker Hill Monument.
Julia Ward Howe
was a prominent American abolitionist, social activist, and poet, most famous as the author of "The Battle Hymn of the Republic".
Dolores Huerta
co-founder of the United Farm Workers
Zora Neale Hurston
writer; such books as Their Eyes Were Watching God.
Anne Hutchinson
Religious leader, wife, mother of 15.She believed & talked to individuals that they could communicate with spirit of christ & interpret biblical teachings & sermons for themselves.Tried 3x - antinomian heresy = questioning authority of the Puritan Church. considered a major figure in the history of religious freedom in America.
Mae Jemison
first African American woman astronaut. A physician with interests in the arts and in science, after leaving NASA Mae Jemison became a university teacher and founded her own technology company.
Mary Harris Jones
Occupation: labor organizerKnown for: radical support of mine workers, radical politicsAlso Known as: Mother of All Agitators, the Miner's Angel. Birth name: Mary Harris. Married name: Mary Harris Jones
Helen Keller
American author, political activist, and lecturer. She was the first deafblind person to earn a Bachelor of Arts degree. learn to communicate despite being blind and deaf
Florence Kelley
work for protective labor legislation for women, against child labor, and for heading National Consumers' League for 34 years
Ann Lee
Mother Ann Lee (29 February 1736 - 8 September 1784) was the leader of the United Society of Believers in Christ's Second Appearing, or Shakers."Utopian Community"-sought to attract converters to gospel of:pacifism, celibacy, racial & gender equality & industrious communal living.
Edmonia Lewis
neoclassical African American and Native American sculptor, friend of abolitionists, and sculptor. Her sculpture, often with Biblical themes or themes of freedom or of famous Americans including many abolitionists, experienced a revival of interest in the twentieth century. She often depicted African, African American, and Native American peoples in her work. Much of her work is lost.
Mary Lyon
-Argued for separate colleges for women.-She established the Wheaton Female Seminary in Norton, Massachusetts, (now Wheaton College). -Within two years, she raised $15,000 to build the Mount Holyoke School. She also established Mount Holyoke Female Seminary (now Mount Holyoke College) in South Hadley, Massachusetts in 1837 and served as its first president (or "principal") for 12 years.
Mary McLeod-Bethune
improving educational opportunities for African Americans; president, National Association of Colored Women; founder, National Council of Negro Women. Her statue in Washington, DC, was the first statue depicting any woman or African American in any park in the nation's capital. Her home is a National Historic Landmark.
Margaret Mead
Known for: study of sex roles in Samoa and other culturesOccupation: anthropologist, writer, scientist; environmentalist, women's rights advocate
Maria Mitchell
first professional woman astronomer in the United States, also an educator and a reformer.
Carol Moseley-Braun
first African American woman elected to the United States Senate, Carol Moseley Braun's run for US President in 2003-2004 also set records for women in politics. She also served as a United States Ambassador.
Lucretia Mott
A member of the women's right's movement in 1840. She was a mother of seven, and she shocked other feminists by advocating suffrage for women at the first Women's Right's Convention in Seneca, New York 1848. Stanton read a "Declaration of Sentiments" which declared "all men and women are created equal.
Mother Seton
-the first native-born citizen of the United States to be canonized(made saint) by the Roman Catholic Church (September 14, 1975). -founded Ladies of charity to help sick and poor.-established Catholic communities in Emmitsburg, Maryland.
Judith Sargent Murray
Occupation: Writer; essayist on political, social, and religious themes; letter writer; poet; dramatistKnown for: "The Gleaner" and an early feminist essay
Carrie Nation
member of the temperance movement, which opposed alcohol in pre-Prohibition America. Noteworthy for promoting her viewpoint through vandalism. On many occasions Nation would enter an alcohol-serving establishment and attack the bar with a hatchet. She has been the topic of numerous books, articles and even an opera.
Sandra Day O'Connor
first woman to serve as an associate justice of the United States Supreme Court. Appointed in 1981 by President Ronald Reagan, and known as often exercising a swing vote.
Rosa Parks
December 1, 1955,was expected to relinquish her seat on the bus for a white man. She refused, was arrested for violating Alabama's segregation laws
Lucy Gonzalez Parsons
anarchist, unsuccessfully organized in her husband's defense when he was accused of violence in the so-called Haymarket Riot of May, 1886 -- he was one of the "Haymarket martyrs" who were hanged. She continued organizing against capitalism and government, and helped organize the IWW (Industrial Workers of the World)
Alice Paul
American suffragist and activist. Along with Lucy Burns and others, she led a successful campaign for women's suffrage that resulted in the passage of the Nineteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution in 1920
Frances Perkins
the U.S. Secretary of Labor from 1933 to 1945, and the first woman appointed to the U.S. Cabinet. As a loyal supporter of her friend, Franklin D. Roosevelt, she helped pull the labor movement into the New Deal coalition. She and Interior Secretary Harold Ickes were the only original members of the Roosevelt cabinet who remained in offices for his entire presidency.
Eliza Lucas Pinckney
@17 yrs old managed her family's 3 plantations in her father's absent & in place of her invalid mother.-taught herself bookkeeping, accounting & how to run business-learned cultivation of rice-imported indigo, developed process to ret indigo plant into dye-marries best friend's widow 20 yrs her senior- Charles Pinckney
Jeannette Rankin
first American woman elected to Congress (November 6, 1916)
Janet Reno
first woman Attorney General, first female states attorney in Florida (1978-1993)
Sally Ride
First woman to orbit the Earth - Challenger STS-7 authored children books
Jane Roe
Norma McCorvey was a young, pregnant woman in Texas without the means or funds to access an abortion. She became the plaintiff "Jane Roe" in Roe v. Wade, decided in 1973, right to privacy under the due process clause in the Fourteenth Amendment to United States Constitution extends a woman's decision to have an abortion
Eleanor Roosevelt
was the First Lady of the United States from 1933 to 1945. She supported the New Deal policies of her husband, Franklin D. Roosevelt, and became an advocate for civil rights. After her husband's death in 1945, Roosevelt continued to be an international author, speaker, politician, and activist for the New Deal coalition. She worked to enhance the status of working women, although she opposed the Equal Rights Amendment because she believed it would adversely affect women.
Deborah Sampson
American woman who impersonated a man in order to serve in the Continental Army during the American Revolutionary War.
Margaret Sanger
Occupation: nurseKnown for: advocating birth control and women's health
Elizabeth Cady Stanton
A member of the women's right's movement in 1840.mother of seven, she shocked other feminists by advocating suffrage for women @first Women's Right's Convention in Seneca, New York 1848. Stanton read a "Declaration of Sentiments" which declared "all men and women are created equal.
Gloria Steinem
American feminist, journalist, and social and political activist became nationally recognized as leader of, and media spokeswoman for, the women's liberation movement in the late 1960s and 1970s.-founded many organizations and projects and recipient of many awards and honors. -columnist for New York magazine and co-founded Ms. magazine. In 1969,published an article, "After Black Power, Women's Liberation" which, along with her early support of abortion rights, catapulted her to national fame as a feminist leader
Lucy Stone
kept her own name after marriage; anti-slavery and woman suffrage activism
Harriet Beecher Stowe
author of Uncle Tom's Cabin, a book which helped build anti-slavery sentiment in America and abroad
Ida Tarbell
American teacher, author and journalist.known as one of the leading "muckrakers" of the progressive era, work known in modern times as "investigative journalism". wrote many notable magazine series and biographies. She is best-known for her 1904 book The History of the Standard Oil Company of corporate America,
Sojourner Truth
After going to court to recover her son, became the first black woman to win such a case against a white man. Her best-known extemporaneous speech on racial inequalities, Ain't I a Woman?, was delivered in 1851 at the Ohio Women's Rights Convention in Akron, Ohio. During the Civil War, Truth helped recruit black troops for the Union Army; after the war, Truth tried unsuccessfully to secure land grants from the federal government for former slaves.
Harriet Tubman
work with Underground Railroad, Civil War service, and later, her advocacy of woman suffrage
Madam C.J. Walker
first African American woman millionaire in America, inventor of the Walker System, supporter of entrepreneurs and economic success among African American women in setting up their own Walker hair care businesses
Mercy Otis Warren
During the debate over the U.S. Constitution in 1788, she issued a pamphlet opposing ratification and advocating the inclusion of a Bill of Rights, which she published under the pseudonym, "A Columbian Patriot." In 1805, she published one of the earliest histories of the American Revolution,History of the Rise, Progress, and Termination of the American Revolution. This work, which she published under her own name, was also the first history of the Revolution authored by a woman.
Ida Wells-Barnett
Journalist, civil rights activist, anti-lynching crusader, Ida Bell Wells-Barnett (1862-1931) was a cofounder of the NAACP and active in women's issues.
Edith Wharton
Author of Ethan Frome and The Age of Innocence
Phillis Wheatley
was the first published African American poet and first African-American woman whose writings were published.
Emma Hart Willard
American women's rights advocate and pioneer who founded the first women's school of higher education.-Troy Female Seminary-make mothers better prepared to raise sons-enable women to be more useful.
Frances Willard
known for heading the Women's Christian Temperance Union, 1879-1898; first dean of women, Northwestern University; appeared on a 1940 postage stamp; first woman represented in Statuary Hall, U.S. Capitol Building
Mary Wollstonecraft
Wollstonecraft is best known for A Vindication of the Rights of Woman (1792), in which she argues that women are not naturally inferior to men, but appear to be only because they lack education. She suggests that both men and women should be treated as rational beings and imagines a social order founded on reason.
Victoria Woodhull
candidate for U.S. President; radicalism as a woman suffrage activist; role in a sex scandal involving Henry Ward Beecher
Mildred Zaharias
Babe Didrikson" considered best female athlete of her time.achieved outstanding success in golf, basketball, and track and field.