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Friday, August 26th, is

Women's Equality Day! 

 

Women's History Month from Time Magazine for Kids, covers suffrage, sports, powerful women, women in US history, Amelia Earhart, Sally Ride, many others.

 

Women's History and Heritage Month "celebrates the contributions that women have made in all aspects of society. Learn more about their accomplishments through our selection of articles and photo galleries." This Smithsonian article covers diverse women like Cleopatra, Harriet Tubman, The Supremes, and Anne Frank. It also heavily covers American women in the arts: music, painting, photography, and writing.

 

Women's History Month from Scholastic turned up articles and teaching ideas for women's rights, feminism, sports, and tons of articles on women in non-traditional fields. Plenty of good material here.

 

Nichelle Nichols, ‘Star Trek’
Trailblazer Lt. Uhura, Dead At 89

 

This link goes to testimonials and clips
of Nichelle Nichol's best work on ST.
Also has her meeting with Dr. Martin
Luther King, Jr. where he told her
she was a civil rights legend so she
could not quit the show!

She also strongly supported NASA!

Nichelle Nichols, Uhura on 'Star Trek,' Boldly Rides NASA's Flying Observatory

Uhura Meets SOFIA - Star Trek’s Nichelle Nichols Flies NASA Observatory | Video

 

The Unsung Heroes Who Ended a Deadly Plague

"How a team of fearless American women overcame medical skepticism
to stop whooping cough, a vicious infectious disease, and save countless
lives."

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Smithsonian Magazine article from March 2022. "Pertussis, otherwise known
as whooping cough, means little to most parents in the developed world
today. But it was once among the great terrors of family life."
Drs.Kendrick and Eldering assembled their own team, got the community
behind them, found donors, and then - "Kendrick, Eldering, and their team
succeeded in developing the first safe and effective whooping cough vaccine."
Read the whole inspiring story of this noble quest in the article. There
are now newer vaccines, but none are better. Remember this:
THERE IS STILL NO CURE FOR WHOOPING COUGH!! Get your kids vaccinated!

 

Women's History Month from the Library of Congress has a link to a very cool Pinterest page about the Suffrage Movement, with plenty of period photos. The Treasures of Women's Suffrage page is also amazing, with all sorts of objects related to women's rights. Check out The National Woman Suffrage Parade, 1913 page, it's also quite interesting. There's a slideshow and oodles of links to other sections of this deceptively large site, covering both victories and defeats.

 

 

In the USA, Native Americans of both genders got the right to vote in 1924, when they officially became citizens. It took until 1948 for all the states to finally let most Native people vote. The last state to fully guarantee voting rights for Native people was Utah in 1962.

 

A Guide to Women's Suffrage "What You Need to Know About Women's Suffrage"
from ThoughtCo. is a big gold mine of links, videos, and other resources. If something
is worth knowing about women's suffrage, it is in here!

 

Twelve Famous Female Chemists "March 8 is International Women's Day.
This graphic takes a look at a selection of women who have been pioneers
in the history of chemistry!" The links here lead to a much larger version
of the graphic shown here (like 1984 X 1203 pixels).

A Salute to Colonel Ruby Bradley. Angel in Fatigues

WW II Uncovered
Colonel Ruby Bradley entered the United States Army
Nurse Corps as a surgical nurse in 1934. She was
serving at Camp John Hay in the Philippines when she
was captured by the Japanese army three weeks after
the attack on Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941.
Soon after the attack on Pearl Harbor, Japanese aircraft
struck Camp John Hay. After the attack, the survivors
attempted to flee to Manila through the mountains.
Bradley and another Army nurse, Lt. Beatrice Chambers,
walked more than 18 miles to a logging camp, where
they cared for civilian refugees, many of them women
and children. On December 28, Bradley and Chambers
were captured and became the first Army nurse POWs
of the war. For the first few months of her captivity,
Bradley was held in an internment camp at John Hay.
“A group of more than 500 men, women and children
were crowded into one building. After about six weeks,
internees received Japanese permission to establish a
small camp hospital. It soon became an obstetrical ward
and nursery, where Bradley and Chambers helped to deliver
13 babies. In 1943, Bradley was transferred to the Santo
Tomas Internment Camp in Manila, where she joined
other U.S. Army and Navy nurse captives. It was there that
she and several other imprisoned nurses earned the title
"Angels in Fatigues" from fellow captives. Suffering from
starvation, she used the room in her uniform for smuggling
surgical equipment into the prisoner-of-war camp.
She assisted in 230 operations. After the war Ruby continued
a military career serving in the Korean War.
She passed in 2002 at the age of 94. Lest We Forget.

 

This is a type M777 155mm towed howitzer.
Its name is Britney.
Britney can easily hit targets 18 - 25 miles away depending
on the type of round being fired.
The crew feeds 46-48Kg (103-106 pound) shells to Britney.
Then they aim, fire, and reload Britney.
Women can do anything they set their minds to.

M777s are now being used by Ukraine!

 

 

Bessie Coleman She came up from a sharecropper family in east Texas. She was of African-American and Cherokee ancestry.
She pulled herself up by her own hard work to become the first woman of African American descent, and the first of Native American descent,
to hold a pilot license. Bessie was not allowed to earn a pilot's license in America because she was not white and she was a woman.
She had to go to France to learn to fly, at a famous French flying school. She was the first black female in the world to be a licensed pilot.
Read the links below to learn more about her, her dreams, and her tragic death.

http://womenshistory.about.com/od/aviationpilots/a/bessie_coleman.htm
http://www.bessiecoleman.com/
http://www.biography.com/people/bessie-coleman-36928
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bessie_Coleman

All Things British Past And Present
by Gwynethe Bell

WWII RESISTANCE FIGHTER WHO HELPED DOWNED
ALLIED PILOTS....AUDREY HEPBURN...
Most people know her as a film actress, but she worked
with the resistance groups during WW2 to defeat the Nazis.
The 15-year-old Hepburn delivered a resistance newspaper.
"I stuffed them in my woolen socks in my wooden shoes, got
on my bike and delivered them," she said. Paper was in short
supply, you see, so each edition was printed on paper smaller
than a napkin. Hepburn's age and ability to speak English
made her uniquely qualified to avoid suspicion. So the
15-year-old future star could slip into an area of downed
Allied pilots to pass messages and bear food packages.
If she had been caught, though, it would have been disastrous.

WE SALUTE THE BRAVERY OF AUDREY HEPBURN.

This was in Belgium during World War Two 1940-1945.


Audrey at age 15.

Wow never knew this, what a
brave young woman she was.

 

Madame C.J. Walker

Entrepreneur, philanthropist, and civil rights advocate
Madam C.J. Walker -- who famously became the first
female self-made millionaire in America -- was born in
1867. Born as Sarah Breedlove in Delta, Louisiana,
Walker was the first child in her family born into freedom
following the signing of the Emancipation Proclamation;
Walker's parents and elder siblings had been slaves on
the Madison Parish plantation. Orphaned by age 7, Walker
was married and then widowed by the time she was 20.
Seeking more opportunities for herself and her young daughter,
Walker moved to St. Louis where she began experimenting
with home remedies to treat scalp diseases. Due to a widespread
lack of indoor plumbing and infrequent bathing, many people at
the time, including Walker, suffered from scalp diseases and hair
loss. Over time, she developed her own line of hair products
especially designed to meet the needs of black women and
founded the Madam C. J. Walker Manufacturing Company.

To promote her hair products, she embarked on a sales drive
throughout the South, holding demonstrations and selling her
goods door to door. In 1908, she opened a college in Pittsburgh,
Pennsylvania to train "hair culturists." Within two years, she moved
to Indianapolis to set up her national headquarters and began
training other African American women in setting up their own
businesses, often as licensed Walker Agents selling her line of hair
care products. At its peak, her company employed over 3,000 people.
Walker was active in the social and political issues of the day,
including joining leaders of the NAACP in their efforts to make lynching
a federal crime. She also made many financial contributions to help
support African American schools, organizations, orphanages, and
retirement homes, among them the largest contribution to preserve
the Washington, DC home of the famous abolitionist Frederick Douglass.
By the time of her death at age 51, this pioneering businesswoman
had become the first American woman to become a self-made millionaire.
Well-known for both her diligence and perseverance, Walker once stated,
"There is no royal flower-strewn path to success. And if there is, I have
not found it - for if I have accomplished anything in life it is because I
have been willing to work hard."
For an inspiring book to introduce young readers to Walker's incredible
life story, we recommend "Vision of Beauty: The Story of Sarah Breedlove
Walker" for ages 7 to 10 at https://www.amightygirl.com/vision-of-beauty
Older teen and adult readers can learn more about Walker's life in two
biographies: "On Her Own Ground: The Life and Times of Madam C.J.
Walker" (http://amzn.to/1FpmjTu) and "The Black Rose"
(http://amzn.to/1xSCo1J).
For readers ages 12 and up, Walker and her daughter are featured in a
book of poems about famous women and their daughters, "Borrowed Names"
at https://www.amightygirl.com/borrowed-names
She is also one of 21 pioneering women featured in the fascinating book
"She Did It! 21 Women Who Changed the Way We Think" for ages 10 and
up at https://www.amightygirl.com/she-did-it
For children's books about more trailblazing African-American women, visit
our blog post "75 Books about Extraordinary Black Mighty Girls and Women"
at https://www.amightygirl.com/blog?p=14276

BLACK HISTORY MINI DOCS – Annie Malone (Video)

Annie Turnbo Malone was C. J. Walker's boss, mentor, and a millionaire
businesswoman in her own right. "One of the first black women to reach
millionaire status did so by launching a hair care empire — and her name
wasn’t Madam C.J. Walker. Entrepreneur Annie Turnbo Malone reached this
milestone at the end of World War I, and she just so happened to give
beauty mogul Walker her start in the cosmetics industry."
From her biography at the State Historical Society of Missouri:
“Annie Turnbo Malone’s legacy as a pioneer in the African American beauty
and cosmetic business has largely been overshadowed by the success of her
former employee, Madam CJ Walker. This is beginning to change,however,
and Malone is now being recognized for her role in launching the industry.”
A well-researched and detailed Wikipedia biography is also available.

 

The True Story of "Hidden Figures,"

the Forgotten Women Who Helped Win the Space Race Includes a preview of the movie. This Smithsonian article says it all. "A new book and movie document the accomplishments of NASA’s black “human computers” whose work was at the heart of the country’s greatest battles" They battled race discrimination as well as the social mores of the 1950s. Women who got married were supposed to quit their jobs and raise kids. Blacks could not find places to live and had separate bathrooms and lunch tables. This is a well-written article and covers a lot of ground. Young people need to know about this.

Snopes discusses this statement.

 

Prehistoric European Cave Artists Were Female
Short article (with links) demonstrates that most of those
hand prints are from women and girls.
"Decorating Altamira Cave" by Arturo Asensio.
Some archaeologists think new research proves that
women did most or all of the early cave paintings.

 

 

 

For all the women that made us women from the blog "Marilyn & Josephine" has brief bios of 14 women who changed the world, in big or small ways. In order: Nawal El Saadawi, Golda Meir, Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, Margaret Cho, Gloria Steinem, Ayaan Hirsi, Coretta Scott King, Manal al-Sharif, Amelia Earheart, Eleanor Roosevelt, Benazir Bhutto, Hilary Rodham Clinton, Shirley Chisholm, and Ruth Bader Ginsburg.

 

 

 

 

 

 

"Dear friends, on the 9th of October 2012, the Taliban shot me on the left side of my forehead. They shot my friends, too," Malala said at the United Nations in July 2013.
"They thought that the bullets would silence us. But they failed."
"And then, out of that silence came, thousands of voices. The terrorists thought that they would change our aims and stop our ambitions, but nothing changed in my life except this: Weakness, fear and hopelessness died. Strength, power and courage was born."

 

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"Girls Not Brides is a global partnership of more than 500
civil society organisations committed to ending child marriage
and enabling girls to fulfil their potential."
Learn about Child Marriage.
Read Girls' Voices
Check out the impacts at News and Analysis
#MyLifeAt15 celebrates the dreams and ambitions we hold
at the age of 15 in support of every girl having the opportunity
to achieve hers, without child marriage holding her back.
Download the .pdf file flyer

Margaret Hamilton developed on-board flight software for the Apollo space program. Software designer, systems engineer, businesswoman. Invented new paradigms for coding that vastly increased the reliability of software. Designed Universal Systems Language (USL).

< That is a stack of code, students.
Back in the day there were no monitors and only 8"

tape reels for storage! You had to run a program to
see if it worked! This was a major incentive in the ques
t to develop better software! Which she did.
Read the Wikipedia article.

How These Female Cavers Recovered New Human Ancestor Fossils
Deep within a cave in South Africa, more than 1,200 individual bones of a new
human ancestor, Homo naledi, were discovered. To recover the bones, six
archaeologists had to rappel down underground shafts and squeeze through
rocky passageways as narrow as 18 centimeters (8 in). The call went out and
all the small, tough, limber athletes who qualified - were all women.

 

 

How Inge Lehmann used earthquakes to discover the Earth’s inner core Very good article from Vox. Plenty of graphics help explain how she did it. This isn't the only good Inge Lehmann article out there, but it had the best combination of biography, brevity, science, and understandable graphics.

 

How One Brilliant Woman Mapped the Secrets of the Ocean Floor "This 4:39 video tells the story of a female geologist, Marie Tharp, whose groundbreaking work in mapmaking helped bring the theory of continental drift into the mainstream. Her ideas (which a male colleague initially dismissed as “girl talk,” 2:34) have helped shape what we know about Earth and its geologic history." She noticed her topographical maps of the ocean floor matched up with a colleague's earthquake charts. This was the "smoking gun". It took until 1970 for scientists to admit she was right and continental drift was real!

 

 

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Maria Sibylla Merian and Daughters: Women of Art and Science, is all about this self-educated German artist and pioneer scientist of 367 years ago. She was a trailblazer in entomology (study of insects), botany (study of plants), the study of biomes, use of the scientific method, and accurate scientific illustration. Read her bio and learn about her beginnings at age 13, studying silkworm metamorphosis. Learn about her daughters, and all the profusely illustrated (that means lots of pix) books she and they wrote about insects and the plants they live with. The paintings, by the way, are beautiful! The narrated slideshow is definitely worth watching to the end. This woman and one daughter went to the Dutch colony of Surinam in South America by themselves (gasp) at a time when "respectable women" did NOT! EVER! DO THAT! Read how the daughters followed in mom's footsteps and became great painters in their own right. They helped illustrate mom's books and kept the books in print, with a little help from Czar Peter (The Great) and other friends. Check out the ladies' paintings here. This site is from The Getty Museum in Los Angeles. Visit if you're in the area, and be amazed.

Summer Birds: The Butterflies of Maria Merian A biography for kids, featured in A Mighty Girl.

 

 

Josephine Baker Dancer, singer, spy, civil rights leader

Students and adults should read thia excellent biography!
Born in Missouri, moved to France, worked her way to being a
famous singer and international diva! Her voice was amazing.
Shirley Bassey*, who lists Baker as one of her great influences,
once said "she went from a 'petite danseuse sauvage' with a
decent voice to 'la grande diva magnifique'.... I swear in all my
life I have never seen, and probably never shall see again, such
a spectacular singer and performer."
She didn't make it in the US, because black, so she became a
French citizen and a Free French spy during WW II. She was now
a national hero of France. Now read the rest!

* Dame Shirley Veronica Bassey DBE
She was appointed a Dame Commander of the Order of the
British Empire (DBE) by Queen Elizabeth II in 1999 for services
to the performing arts. Dame Bassey is a pretty fair singer in
her own right.

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Dr. Mary H. Schweitzer, Phd "It's a girl and she's pregnant," Dr. Schweitzer said to her lab assistant, Jennifer Wittmeyer. These two researchers used ingenious lab techniques to discover soft tissue in T-Rex fossils. At a presentation at the Black Hills Institute in 2005, we in the audience watched spellbound as she gently pulled and stretched 68 million year old tissue from medullary bone from an ovulating T-Rex's femur!

This shows (1) there is still a lot to learn about fossilization and (2) yet more proof that birds ARE dinosaurs.
And that leg bone is still 68 million years old, soft tissue and all.

 

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  Lucy Maud Montgomery "was a Canadian author best known for a series of novels beginning in 1908 with Anne of Green Gables. Anne of Green Gables was an immediate success. The central character, Anne, an orphaned girl, made Montgomery famous in her lifetime and gave her an international following." (Wikipedia)

 

 

 

"Maud Menten ( 1879 – 1960) was born in Port Lambton, Ontario. She was a Canadian physician-scientist who made significant contributions to enzyme kinetics and histochemistry. Her name is associated with the famous Michaelis–Menten equation in biochemistry. She was among the first women in Canada to earn a medical doctorate. At the time she completed her thesis work at University of Chicago, women were not allowed to do research in Canada, so she did her research in Germany." From Wikipedia via Sally Michaelis on Pinterest.
At Menten's death, colleagues Aaron H. Stock and Anna-Mary Carpenter honored the Canadian biochemist in an obituary in Nature: "Menten was untiring in her efforts on behalf of sick children. She was an inspiring teacher who stimulated medical students, resident physicians and research associates to their best efforts. She will long be remembered by her associates for her keen mind, for a certain dignity of manner, for unobtrusive modesty, for her wit, and above all for her enthusiasm for research."

 

 

 

Maya Angelou was an American author, poet, and civil rights activist. She published seven autobiographies, three books of essays, and several books of poetry, and was credited with a list of plays, movies, and television shows spanning over 50 years. (Wikipedia)

Maya Angelou/Quotes
I've learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel.
There is no greater agony than bearing an untold story inside you.
If you don't like something, change it. If you can't change it, change your attitude.
All my work, my life, everything I do is about survival, not just bare, awful, plodding survival, but survival with grace and faith. While one may encounter many defeats, one must not be defeated.

 

 

 

 

"The world has lost a great voice today. A self-taught master of the written word, Angelou also spoke no less than six languages. A traumatic and violent childhood, marked by years of silence, led to a blossoming of her artistry and her gifts. She was a champion for civil rights and justice, and on the inner circle with Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. In 2011 she received our nation's highest civilian honor, the Medal of Freedom. We know now why the caged bird sings, and we release her spirit today back to the starry heavens. May your light shine ever on, Maya Angelou." - George Takei

 

 

Minnie Spotted Wolf This tough, 5'5" (165 cm) ranch hand from the Blackfoot Nation in northwest Montana set fence posts and broke wild horses before joining the US Marines in World War II. She was a heavy equipment operator, a truck driver, and a mechanic. When the war was over, she went home and taught school for 29 years, raised four kids, and kept working on the ranch. She could outride the young men of her people into her 50s. "Mom was proud of who she was. She wasn't in the military just for herself, but for the Indian people. She wanted others to know who she was and where she came from." Another hard-working, honest, no-nonsense Native American woman.

 

SABATON's animated video 'Night Witches' is one of two videos here
that tell the story of Soviet women bomber pilots of WWII and the rickety
old crates they had to fly. They bled for those medals they're wearing.
32 of them died in battle against Hitler's Nazis.
Click on this photo to see another version of the story.

The 588th Night Bomber Regiment - renamed as the 46th Taman Guards
Night Bomber Regiment (Guards = high status, more pay, better equipment)

"Night witches" was the name given by the Nazis to the women military aviators of the
who flew in wood-and-canvas Polikarpov U-2 biplanes. Seen here in preparation for
the 'Victory Parade’ in June 1945.

From left to right: Rufina Gasheva, Irina Sebrova, Natalia Meklin, Marina Chechneva,
Nadezhda Popova, Seraphima Amosova, Evdokia Nikulina, Evdokia Bershanskaya,
Maria Smirnova, Evgeniya Zhigulenko. Wearing their dress uniforms on Soviet
Victory Day, 9 May 1945.
Credits: WW2 Colourised Photos, (Color by Klimbim)

 

 

Yekaterina Mikhailova-Demina - combat medic, Soviet Marines recondo

Ekaterina Mikhailova-Demina (22 December 1925 – 24 June 2019)
was a Russian combat medic who was the only woman to have
served in front-line reconnaissance in the Soviet marines during
World War II.
Credits: WW2 Colourised Photos, (Color by Klimbim)

 

Snopes discusses this statement.

 

 

Women's History Month from the History Channel. "Growing out of a small-town school event in California, Women's History Month is a celebration of women's contributions to history, culture and society. The United States has observed it annually throughout the month of March since 1987. Much like a fractal "tree", this site branches out and goes on and on... You'll love it! Suffice it to say there are 22 videos, 10 photo galleries; links to themes, events, biographies, suffragettes, wars, and more.

Grandmother's Choice: Votes for Women

Nothing gets you into history better than your own ancestors' stories.
This is the story of Katharine Hepburn's mother, aunts, and grandmother,
who were in the forefront of the Women's Sufferage Movement in America,
over 100 years ago. Katherine Houghton Hepburn did not rest after
the 19th Amendment was passed. She joined with Margaret Sanger
to fight for legalized birth control. "
Her namesake daughter Katharine Hepburn, the movie star,
(four Academy Awards for Best Actress) told Life Magazine in the 1940s,
'My mother is important. I am not.' " Read it for yourself at this site,
which also links to the story of the British "suffragettes" and "suffragists",
and mentions the struggles of Australian suffragists.
(You may have noticed this is a quilting site. One of our team members quilts,
and noticed the value of this "piecework" of the "fabric" of women's history.)

 

From Katharine Hepburn's IMDb Bio: "Her first name is often misspelled as
Katherine, it is actually spelled Katharine with a second A. She was known for
correcting those who spelled it wrong."

 

Jazz bandleader Ina Ray Hutton

She danced like Mata Hari, she sang like Betty Boop's big sister, she shook it like a bowl of soup. And she was smart enough to work out that a top quality, all-girl jazz band would take the 1930s by storm. So how come Ina Ray Hutton, "the Blond Bombshell of Rhythm", is all but forgotten? A recently released three-disc set, The Definitive Collection, shows that she was no slouch or novelty act, either. "I'm selling this show as a music programme," she'd say with a wink, "but if curves attract an audience, so much the better."
Hutton had apple-pie looks and a jaw-dropping figure. She led her all-girl band, the Melodears, right through the 30s, popping up on screen in The Big Broadcast of 1936 alongside Bing Crosby and Al Bowlly. This was a remarkable feat when you consider there were so few other female jazz musicians in the 30s – the most visible were vibes player Margie Hyams and trumpeter Billie Rogers, both in Woody Herman's band.
Hutton was born Odessa Cowan in 1916, and grew up with her half-sister June (also a successful singer) in a black neighborhood on Chicago's south side. US census records record her as being "negro" and "mulatto", but Hutton "passed" as white throughout her career. She studied dance, picking up a rave review in her local black newspaper, the Chicago Defender, when she was just seven, and made her Broadway debut at 14. She was 18 when the jazz impresario Irving Mills put together the all-woman band that became the Melodears and made her the leader, changing her name to Hutton to take advantage of the notorious reputation of the Woolworths heiress Barbara Hutton.
The Melodears were an instant hit, touring solidly for five years and appearing in several Paramount film shorts of their own, including the enticingly titled Feminine Rhythm (1935), Accent on Girls (1936) and Swing, Hutton, Swing (1937). The latter included the excellent Truckin', and a surviving clip reveals them to be an extremely tight and exciting band: guitarist Helen Baker keeps time by bobbing her head as Ina Ray does her best to tap dance in a tight black gown that pretty much glues her knees together. You half expect the camera to pan round and reveal a crowd of Chuck Jones's cartoon wolves, leering and cheering.
The Melodears' outfits ranged from boyish trousers to long, ultra-feminine, sequined outfits. Downbeat magazine reported that Hutton's stage wardrobe included 400 gowns. Hutton would pave the way for a wave of female bands who took off in the 40s, when many leading male musicians were serving in the US armed forces. However, in 1939, she made the contrary decision to disband the Melodears and recruit an all-male band, including the saxophonist Serge Chaloff. Hutton was tired of her band being seen as a novelty act – reviews were uniformly snippy – and she told Downbeat she was "through with glamour". To emphasise the point, she even went brunette. It wasn't until the 1950s, by now fronting the Ina Ray Hutton Show on TV, that she got the girls back together, winning an Emmy in the process. Her last recorded performance came in the 1975 film Brother, Can You Spare a Dime? and she died in California in 1984.
One possible reason Ina Ray Hutton has been overlooked is that she cut very few records, mostly for Okeh and Elite in the early 40s; radio broadcasts make up the bulk of The Definitive Collection. Also, so many details of her story seem frustratingly buried. Interviews were rare, and there is precious little available online, but the bare bones – a platinum blond pioneer for women in music, fashion and television – cry out for a biopic. YouTube could help rebuild her reputation.
The critics may have had it in for her – luckily for us, the camera loved her. Jazz bandleader Ina Ray Hutton pioneered the way for female stars in music, fashion and television. It's high time she was rediscovered!

 

Hypatia of Alexandria

"Hypatia's death has long been recognized as a watershed mark in history
delineating the classical age of paganism from the age of Christianity."

A mob of "Christian" monks dragged her into a church, took all
her clothes and jewelry, skinned her alive and then burned
her at the stake.
She was an uppity woman who wasn't barefoot and pregnant
and wasn't in the kitchen. She was well educated, so she must
be a witch.

" At any rate, these monks, under the leadership of St. Cyril's
right-hand man, Peter the Reader, shamefully stripped her naked,
and there, close to the altar and the cross, scraped her flesh from
her bones with oyster shells. The marble floor of the church was
sprinkled with her warm blood. The altar, the cross, too, were
bespattered, owing to the violence with which her limbs were torn,
while the hands of the monks presented a sight too revolting to
describe. The mutilated body, upon which the murderers feasted
their fanatic hate, was then flung into the flames."

"In the aftermath of Hypatia's death, the University of Alexandria was
sacked and burned on orders from Bishop Cyril, pagan temples were
torn down, and there was a mass exodus of intellectuals and artists
from Alexandria.

Bishop Cyril was later declared a saint by the church for his efforts in
suppressing paganism and fighting for the true faith."

These "Christians" hated heathen books, science, other Christians (like
Arian, Monophystite and Nestorian "heretics"), heathen religions, and philosophers
like Socrates and Plato, GLBTQ+, also women and girls, and they really,
really hated Jews. So they burned down all the synagogues and
temples in Egypt. The Muslims and people of India spent the hundreds
of years of the Dark Ages rebuilding the knowledge that was burned in the
Library.

"Saint" Kate Barnard of Oklahoma. First woman in America to be elected to a statewide office. This amazing little woman was elected before women could vote. She was a major influence on the Constitution of the new state of Oklahoma. She was able to get 30 laws passed to protect prisoners, the poor, orphans, union members, Native Americans, etc. "She was one of the few public officials who dared to cry out against the abuse of Native American children." When she died, sick and alone, corrupt politicians (whom she had exposed) arranged for her burial in an unmarked grave. This Wikipedia article was the most complete, most unbiased one available.

 

 

Canadian Emily Carr of Victoria, BC, noted artist and dog lover. Champion of First Nations art forms, Emily Carr’s ongoing commitment to establish a strong and inclusive voice for Aboriginal students recognizes that Aboriginal art forms are vital expressions of cultural identity. Emily Carr University of Art and Design is named for her.

 

 

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Marie Curie and the Science of Radioactivity This online exhibit is brought to us by The Center for History of Physics, A Division of The American Institute of Physics. Everything you wanted to know about Maria "Manya" Sklodowska, Polish patriot and underground college student; and about Madam Dr. Marie Sklowdowska Curie, PhD: Pioneering research scientist. Inventor of a mobile X-ray lab in a truck for the French Army during World War I, she then organized a fleet of them for battlefield surgeons. Discovered two elements: polonium and radium. Wife, mother, and winner of two Nobel Prizes (and always a Polish patriot).

There is a short version , for those who have a report to crank out (life tip: don't put off doing your assignments).

There's a long version that covers everything and has links to other science bios. Both are very readable, and will leave you in awe of this amazing lady.

More links about her: Nobelprize.org discusses her her discoveries in radioactivity and chemistry and has her Nobel lectures. Some trivia: In 1935 Marie's daughter, Irène Joliot-Curie, was awarded the Chemistry Prize together with her husband Frédéric Joliot for the discovery of artificial radioactivity. Two generations of female Nobel Prize winners doesn't happen often. About.com has a short bio and a list of Curie links.

 

Zombie Marie Curie tells it like it is:

 

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"This one's for the girls." - Martina McBride

 

Lise Meitner of Austria and Sweden

Nuclear physicist, discovered nuclear fission, did all of the things Zombie Marie Curie said. Fled to Sweden ahead of the Nazis. Realized fission could be used to make atomic bombs - and the Nazis were close to figuring that out. Got word of this threat to the US government via Albert Einstein. Because she was a pacifist, she refused to go to America to work on the Manhattan Project. This little blurb about her does not pay proper tribute to Dr. Meitner or to her accomplishments. Check the link for more. Her bio is fascinating.

 

 

 

Emmy Noether (1882 - 1935) was an awesomely brilliant German mathematician.
Einstein called her a genius. She developed Noether’s Theorem, (yes, THAT Noether) "an expression of the deep tie between the underlying geometry of the universe and the behavior of the mass and energy that call the universe home." Mostly she worked in abstract algebra; her theorems were a sideline. It's hard to explain what she did if you don't have a strong background in calculus and physics. You can find out more here and here. Dr. Noether fled to America ahead of the Nazis in 1933. Sadly, she died of cancer two years later. :(

 

For most of history, Anonymous was a woman. - Virginia Woolf

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Sophie Germain of France 1776 - 1831 "All things considered, she was probably the most profoundly intellectual woman that France has ever produced." –H. J. Mozans, 1913. Mme. Germain was a self-taught mathematician who "did math" for the love of the subject. Her battles for acceptance by the all-male establishment went on for most of her life. With the help of some well-known male mathematicians (Fourier, Gauss, and Lagrange), her work was finally recognized beginning in 1816, when she won a prize from the French Academy of Science for her mathematical explanation of a tough physics problem. Her best known accomplishments are: (1) her partial proof of Fermat's Last Theorem which paved the way for later mathematicians - it was finally solved by Andrew Wiles in 1995 (!); and (2) her work on prime numbers (yes, THAT Sophie Germain). Sophie Germain Primes are named for her! She used them to find that partial proof of Fermat's Last Theorem.

 

 

Sofia Kovalevskaya of Russia 1850-1891 Pioneering mathematician and novelist. Not allowed to attend Russian universities because she was female. So she went to Germany, attended the University of Heidelberg, impressed Kirchoff (of Kirchoff's Law fame) and other faculty with her brilliance. Studied math under the famous mathematician Weierstrass. "By the spring of 1874, Kovalevskaya had completed three papers. Weierstrass deemed each of these worthy of a doctorate. The three papers were on partial differential equations, Abelian integrals, and Saturn's Rings. In 1874 Kovalevskaya was granted her doctorate, summa cum laude, from Göttingen University in Germany." Still could not get a professor post anywhere in Russia because (guess why) ...... female. A Swedish friend got her a post at the University of Stockholm. She was the first editor of the respected mathematics journal, Acta Mathematica. "The high point of Sofia's career came on Christmas Eve of 1888, when she was presented the famous Prix Bordin of the French Academy of Sciences in recognition of her winning mathematical paper, 'On the Problem of the Rotation of a Solid Body about a Fixed Point'. This got her a lifetime chair in mathematics at the University of Stockholm in 1889, and a membership in the Russian Academy of Sciences. In early 1891 Kovalevskaya suddenly died of influenza complicated by pneumonia." She was only 41 years old :( Credit for these facts goes to Russiapedia's article about her.

 

 

Rachel Carson Beloved, awesome scientist, ecologist, and pioneer of the environmental movement. Author of Silent Spring* and The Sea Around Us, among other works. The first scientist to warn us about the abuse of the environment by overuse and overspraying of pesticides. She was slandered and vilified by giant chemical corporations who tried to silence her, but her peer-reviewed science has been proven correct by history. Our link goes to the excellent site by Linda Lear. (*Available all over the internet as a pdf file)

 

 

Dr. Rosalind Franklin Pioneer Molecular Biologist. Dr. Franklin, an Englishwoman, was responsible for much of the research and discovery work that led to the understanding of the structure of DNA. J. D. Bernal called her X-ray photographs of DNA "the most beautiful X-ray photographs of any substance ever taken." Between 1951 and 1953 Rosalind Franklin came very close to solving the DNA structure. She was beaten to publication by Crick and Watson because a male colleague, who did not approve of female scientists, showed Watson one of Franklin's crystallographic portraits of DNA. Her research was used without her knowledge or permission. When Watson saw the picture, the solution became apparent to him, and the results went into an article in Nature almost immediately. Dr. Franklin did not know that others were using her research! The man who "borrowed" it went on to share the Nobel Prize with Crick and Watson in 1962. Rosalind Franklin died of ovarian cancer in 1958. This good woman was only 37. NPR's article: Rosalind Franklin: Dark Lady of DNA and SDSC & UC San Diego's page above were the sources of much of this information.
But wait, there's more!

 

Rosalind Franklin: DNA's unsung hero, by Cláudio L. Guerra. From TED-Ed Original Lessons. "The discovery of the structure of DNA was one of the most important scientific achievements in human history. The now-famous double helix is almost synonymous with Watson and Crick, two of the scientists who won the Nobel prize for figuring it out. But there’s another name you may not know: Rosalind Franklin. Cláudio L. Guerra shares the true story of the woman behind the helix." She did the work and they got the credit (you know, sexism). In this case, outright theft was involved. "Somebody" stole Dr. Franklin's work and used it to figure out the double helix.

 

Nancy Wake There are quite a few videos about this WW II heroine. Born in New Zealand and raised in Australia, worked as a reporter in Paris, hated Nazis, became a fighter in the Resistance, then a British secret agent. She was awesome but modest. "I raced up the back stairs, threw open the door, threw in a grenade, and ran like hell." Farewell to the White Mouse

 

Artemisia Gentileschi, Baroque Painter, Italy, 1600s

National Gallery Shakes off Tired, Lazy View of Artemisia Gentileschi as “Victim”

 

Hua Mulan, Warrior, China

 

Kate Sheppard Memorial, New Zealand

 

Mum Shirl MP , Native Australian, community leader, and Member of Parliament, Australia

 

María Eva Duarte de Perón (1919 – 1952)
Evita, the Soul of Argentina

 

Rani Lakshmi Bai of India
Heroine of The Mutiny of 1857.
(She knew how to use that sword.)

 

Kiran Bedi of India and Nepal
Law Enforcement

 

 

Sybil Ludington was a 16 year old heroine of the American Revolutionary War. (Picture and text from A Mighty Girl's FB page.) 16-year-old Sybil Ludington became a hero of the American Revolutionary War. At approximately 9 pm on April 26, 1777, Sybil, the eldest daughter of Colonel Henry Ludington, climbed onto her horse and proceeded to ride 40 miles in order to muster local militia troops in response to a British attack on the town of Danbury, Connecticut -- covering twice the distance that Paul Revere rode during his famous midnight ride. Riding all night through rain, Sybil returned home at dawn having given nearly the whole regiment of 400 Colonial troops the order to assemble. While the regiment could not save Danbury from being burned, they joined forces with the Continental Army following the subsequent Battle of Ridgefield and were able to stop the British advance and force their return to their boats. Following the battle, General George Washington personally thanked Sybil for her service and bravery. To introduce your children to this inspiring and underrecognized hero of the Revolutionary War, we recommend "Sybil’s Night Ride," a picture book for children 4 to 8 and "Sybil Ludington’s Midnight Ride," an early chapter book for readers 6 to 9. An illustration from the latter by Ellen Beier is pictured here. Sybil Ludington was also the focus of an episode of Liberty's Kids, the animated educational historical fiction television series, which you can view on YouTube at http://bit.ly/1tMrkk5.

 

There are several excellent sites about White Rose.
Here is the Holocaust Encyclopedia page.



And thou shalt act as if
On thee and on thy deed
Depended the fate of all Germany,
And thou alone must answer for it.
Johann Gottlieb Fichte 1762-1814

 

 

 

Women Airforce Service Pilots (WASPs) of WWII
A multimedia presentation of the National Women's
History Museum.

 

Dorothy Olsen, World War II WASP pilot, dies at 103

Here she is posing on a P-38. She preferred to fly P-51s.
Read the article to find out why. (Historical note: "P" stood
for "Pursuit"; later changed to "F" for "Fighter", still in use.)

 

 

Cartoon from an Australian newspaper, 1900.

Caption: "Hey, you man! Where's that vote you promised me?" She got it in 1903.

Australia was the first country to allow women to run for parliament.

Australian Aboriginal women like Mum Shirl could not vote until 1962.

June 24, 2010: Julia Gillard was sworn in as Australia's first female prime minister.

 

 

 

 

The Swashbuckling History of Women Pirates from Smithsonian magazine online. "When women roamed the high seas in search of fortune, freedom, and sometimes revenge." This page wants to make sure the newly discovered history of women pirates does not get re-buried. A woman historian named Laura Sook Duncombe wrote a book about them - Pirate Women: The Princesses, Prostitutes, and Privateers Who Ruled the Seven Seas Everyone knows about Mary Read and Anne Bonny. What about Ladgertha, Grace O’Malley, the great Chinese woman pirate Cheng I Sao, Queen Artemisia of ancient Greece, Lady Mary Killigrew, the Moroccan pirate queen Sayyida al-Hurra, and many more? “I wanted something to point at as incontrovertible truth that women are as much a part of pirate history as men,” Ms. Duncombe said. This is a good read. The interview was done by a female lawyer, which counts, as you will see.

 

Women in Science - A Selection of 16 Significant Contributors , from The San Diego Supercomputer Center of USD La Jolla. Bios of 16 distinguished women scientists from the 1800s until now. Also includes mathematics, statistics, computers, and management. Good source material here.

 

Women Who Changed America - An Unfinished Journey " is dedicated to telling the stories of amazing women who helped shape America. We want to inspire women to follow their dreams and make their lives extraordinary. We are dedicated to creating a fund that rewards math and science teachers and grants scholarships to young women." Read about women who changed America in the field of Politics, Workplace, Wellness, Sports, and the Arts. Click on any woman's photo to learn about her life. Watch the videos. Share your own personal stories about women who changed, or are changing, America. "We would love to hear the stories about the amazing women who have inspired you and your loved ones. Please share your stories, upload your pictures, post a short video.
Our aim is to showcase the lives and accomplishments of women all over America."

 

 

Women Scientists of Antiquity This article appeared in the March 2017 issue of Discover magazine.
Credit for the article: Lacy Schley is listed as the author.
Since it can't be read online (paywall) unless you have a subscription (which we do), we will share it online here,
on our educational site. Or you can always buy the magazine, anywhere. "Marie Curie. Rosalind Franklin. Ada Lovelace.
Before these wonder women of modern science could make their marks, another group of females would leave their
own scientific legacies in great, ancient civilizations." Presenting the famous five:

2700 B.C.: Merit Ptah
The Egyptian physician was the first woman in medicine, and perhaps all of science, mentioned by name in texts.
Her son, a high priest, called her “the chief physician,” and her portrait appears in a tomb in the Valley of the Kings.

2300 B.C.: Enheduanna
A Sumerian woman appointed as high priestess of the moon goddess. Her prestigious religious title included duties
related to astronomy, such as establishing observatories and tracking the movements of the moon and stars.

1200 B.C.: Tapputi-Belatikallim
A Babylonian perfumer considered the world’s first chemist and first mentioned in cuneiform tablets.
“Belatikallim” is a title suggesting she might have been a high-ranking scientist.

Third century B.C.: Agnodike
Grecian law at the time forbade women from studying or practicing medicine — punishable by death.
So Agnodike dressed as a man to learn the trade. She established a reputation as an expert
in women’s diseases before revealing herself, which helped overturn the law.

First century A.D.: Miriam the Jewess
This alchemist lived in Alexandria and is perhaps the first female scientist to have her work preserved in any form.
Descriptions of her designs for alchemical and chemical equipment were included in Egyptian encyclopedias
compiled in the third century A.D.

 

Here's a list of some famous American women, and their movements & publications, from Wikipedia and other places.

Bella Abzug Grace Hopper National Women's Hall of Fame Venus & Serena Williams

Gloria Steinem Abigail Adams Molly Ivins Jacqueline Cochran Lucille Ball Tina Fey

Women's Media Center Mary Pickford Mary McLeod Bethune Lady Gaga Cher

Oprah Winfrey Brandi Chastain Kay Yow Clara Hale Maya Angelou Maria Tallchief

Dr. Mary Schweitzer Twenty Fortune 500 Women CEOs Dr. Sally Ride Joan Baez

Hillary Rodham Clinton Wilma Mankiller Nancy Ward Katharine Hepburn

Angie Debo Kate Barnard Loretta Lynn Minnie Spotted Wolf Wendy Davis

 

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