Why is a Crater on the Moon and an Asteroid Named for Maria Mitchell?

Maria Mitchell and female astronomers from Vassar
America’s most prominent female scientists in the second half of the 19th century, Vassar Professor Maria Mitchell is shown here in the 1880s with students from her astronomy class.

She is the only champion of women’s rights in the last two centuries to have both a crater on the moon and an asteroid named in her honor. Maria Mitchell was a star of 19th century American science who used astronomy to expand the boundaries of what women could expect and achieve. Her life and work are a root of the Science, Technology, Engineering and Math (STEM) movement that today draws ever larger numbers of young women to scientific careers. But, ironically, Mitchell is not well know to most of them.

Continue reading “Why is a Crater on the Moon and an Asteroid Named for Maria Mitchell?”

Diane Crump: Horse-Crazy Girl Who Revolutionized Thoroughbred Racing

Historic horse race in 1969 that changed the rules.
Riding Bridle ‘N Bit in the 7th race at Hialeah Park on February 7, 1969, Diane Crump (center) smashed through the barriers that kept women from participating in the sport of thoroughbred racing.

Until the 1960s, gender discrimination was a proud fact of life in the male-only world of thoroughbred horse racing in the United States. Females could not be licensed as jockeys. But a gutsy, 5-foot tall, 104 pound slip of a woman named Diane Crump changed all that at Florida’s Hialeah Park in 1969.

Continue reading “Diane Crump: Horse-Crazy Girl Who Revolutionized Thoroughbred Racing”

The First Niagara Falls “Barrel” Daredevil: Annie Edson Taylor

Annie Edson Taylor with her Horseshoe Falls barrel
Destitute and desperate, former charm school teacher Annie Edson Taylor went over Horseshoe Falls in a barrel in 1901 and cashed in on her brief celebrity selling books, photos and talks about herself. Later institutionalized, she died penniless.

 

Talk about a tough old broad. Annie Edson Taylor was the first, and the oldest, person to survive a tumble over Niagara falls in a pillow-padded barrel of her own design. At a time when women were expected to be docile, delicate and fragile, Annie Edson Taylor was a fearless, foolhardy badass.

Continue reading “The First Niagara Falls “Barrel” Daredevil: Annie Edson Taylor”

A Slave Who Sewed Her Way to Freedom and The White House

Against all odds, Elizabeth Keckley rose from being a whipped and raped plantation slave girl to become the confidant and famed dressmaker of First Lady Mary Todd Lincoln during the Civil War.

Elizabeth Hobbs Keckley wasn’t born to greatness. She was born the daughter of an enslaved woman on a Virginia plantation. Sent to North Carolina, where she was repeatedly beaten and whipped in an effort to break her spirit. Given to a white merchant who used her as his concubine and raped her for four years. Pregnant at age 20. Not exactly the makings of a success story.

Continue reading “A Slave Who Sewed Her Way to Freedom and The White House”

Virginia Hall – The One-Legged WWII Super Spy the Nazis Couldn’t Catch

Spy Virginia Hall and one of the war-ravaged French towns she worked in.
Although she was one of the World War II Allied Forces’ most important spies, the exploits of Virginia Hall remained unknown to the world until recently. She worked in battle-torn France for British forces and ultimately became a member of the OSS, the forerunner of the CIA.

Virginia Hall never spoke publicly about her remarkable life because she knew too many people who “were killed for talking too much.” So, until recently, her story was known only within the intelligence community, where documents were known to disappear and code names were so numerous it was hard to know who was who.

Continue reading “Virginia Hall – The One-Legged WWII Super Spy the Nazis Couldn’t Catch”

Frances Marion: Trailblazing Screenwriter of Hollywood’s Golden Age

Mary Pickford and Frances Marion on set in 1920
On set at a United Artists film shoot in 1920 are Frances Marion (right) and Mary Pickford (left). Marion, who wrote the scripts for more than 130 films during during Hollywood’s Golden Age, was one of the most highly-paid screen writers of her era.

Google “top 25 greatest screenwriters of all time” and you’ll find every single one of them is a man. But from 1915 into the 1930s, a woman named Frances Marion was the most successful and highest-paid screenwriter in show biz.

Continue reading “Frances Marion: Trailblazing Screenwriter of Hollywood’s Golden Age”