March is approaching, which means so is Women’s History Month! This means, that in history classes across the country on National Women’s Day, they’re going to talk about the same women. A.K.A, the suffragettes, Harriet Tubman and Marie Curie. By no means am I saying that we should not celebrate them. I wouldn’t even be able to vote if it wasn’t for women like Susan B. Anthony, Sojourner Truth, Lucy Stone, Lucretia Mott, etc. But what about the rest of the women you don’t learn about?
1. Ida Tarbell - Tarbell is the mother of investigative journalism, and she was the only woman in her graduating class from Allegheny College in 1880.
2. Jeannette Rankin – The first woman ever elected to the U.S Congress.
3. Betty Friedan – Friedan is regarded as mother of feminism. Wrote The Feminine Mystique and ignited the feminist movement in the ‘60’s and ‘70’s.
4. Margaret Sanger – Margaret Sanger campaigned for the legalization of birth control (yes, it was once illegal), established the first birth control clinic and established many organizations that have since evolved into the Planned Parenthood Federation of America.
5. Ada Lovelace – She is known as the first computer programmer (a field now widely dominated by men), she left behind the first computer program in the mid 1800’s, a theoretical coding process for machines.
6. Abigail Adams – She was John Adam's wife, she appealed to her husband to protect the rights of women, and was a member of the Daughters of Liberty.
7. Clara Barton – She was a nurse, humanitarian and teacher during the Civil War, and she started the American Red Cross.
8. Amelia Earhart – Amelia Earhart was the first woman to fly solo nonstop across the Atlantic.
9. Jane Addams – Addams was the Founder of Settlement House Movement. She was also the first American Woman to earn Nobel Peace Prize in 1931 as president of Women's International League for Peace and Freedom.
10. Shirley Chisholm - First African American woman elected to Congress, and later made a bid for the Democratic nomination in the 1972 presidential campaign.
11. Sandra Day O'Connor – She was the first woman Supreme Court Justice.
Women make history every day, these are only a few of the women we should be aware of. These women have more than made their place in history, and I hope that this inspires you to do the same!
