7 Influential Women You Probably Haven’t Heard Of
By Claire Gunthert
By Claire Gunthert
Starting in 1987, March has been nationally recognized as Women’s History Month. There are many women who are widely recognized for their accomplishments, acts of bravery or defiance, and setting a new example for girls and women everywhere; Rosa Parks, Amelia Earhart, Marie Curie, Michelle Obama, Malala Yousafzai. But there are so many women who haven’t been recognized for what they’ve done to help women and the world. Here are seven of those women.
Coretta Scott King
Okay, you’ve probably heard of Coretta Scott King. She was the wife of the Civil Rights leader Martin Luther King, Jr. But Coretta Scott King not only helped her husband and played a huge part in the Civil Rights movement, she also had numerous other accomplishments; establishing the King Center and Martin Luther King, Jr. Day, fighting for the end of apartheid in South Africa, helping to close the employment gap in the US, and fighting for women’s rights and LGBTQ+ rights.
Claudette Colvin
Everyone knows the story of Rosa Parks - how she refused to give up her seat on a bus, how she got arrested. This is also the story of 15 year old Claudette Colvin, who refused to get up on the bus for a white man because it was her constitutional right, and ended up arrested. And she did this a whole 9 months before Rosa Parks. Commenting on the incident, she said that “my head was just too full of black history, you know, the oppression that we went through. It felt like Sojourner Truth was on one side pushing me down, and Harriet Tubman was on the other side of me pushing me down. I couldn't get up.”
Mary Edwards Walker
The Presidential Medal of Honor has been given countless times, but in all of US History, only one woman has been awarded this medal; Mary Edwards Walker. Her parents insisted that she get the same schooling as her brothers, and eventually saved up enough money to attend Syracuse Medical School. She began a medical practice, and when she wasn’t allowed to join the Union’s efforts in the Civil War, she volunteered as a nurse. She started treating soldiers on the front lines. Eventually, in 1863, she became the first female surgeon. She was held as a prisoner of war for four months, and refused to wear the womens clothes they provided her - she wore men’s clothes because they were more comfortable and hygienic. After the war, she was awarded the Presidential Medal of Honor by President Andrew Johnson.
Nellie Bly
When Nellie Bly, a journalist for New York World, wanted to write an article about the experiences of immigrants in the United States, the editor declined her story. However, he challenged her to write a piece about one of New York’s mental hospitals. She decided to fake mental illness and go inside the institution and expose how patients were treated. Her six-part installment, Ten Days in a Mad House, quickly made her one of the most famous journalists in the United States. But her adventure didn’t end there - later, she travelled the world in 72 days, which led her to gain a world record.
Margaret Bancroft
Bancroft was a female leader of education in the late 1800s. At just 29 years old, she opened the first private boarding school in New Jersey for children with disabilities, called the Haddonfield School for the Mentally Deficient and Peculiarly Backward (later renamed the Bancroft Training School). This school offered programs that were tailored to the specific needs of the children, and students were given all the necessities, recreational activities and trips, and lessons for their mental ages. She was very ahead of the time, and laid the framework for special education.
Florence Nightingale (163)
Ever since Florence Nightingale was a young girl, she knew that she wanted to be a nurse. During the Crimean War, hospitals in England were understaffed due to their refusal to hire female nurses - but after the War of Alma, they decided to hire female nurses to tend to the injured and ill. The Secretary of War, Sidney Herbert, reached out to Nightingale, so she formed a group of 34 nurses and went to Crimea. Nightingale procured equipment, and spent all of her time caring for the soldiers. Her work in reducing the hospital’s death rates by two-thirds earned her the titles of “the Lady with the Lamp” and “the Angel of the Crimea.” Afterwards, in 1860, she funded the Nightingale Training School for Nurses. Even after being affected by a disease she had contracted during the Crimean War that left her bedridden, she continued to work, publishing a book on how to run civilian hospitals and giving advice throughout the US Civil War. In 1908, she received the merit of honor by King Edward.
Image Link: https://www.plannedparenthood.org/planned-parenthood-pacific-southwest/blog/national-womens-history-month-2
My Life, My Love, My Legacy by Coretta Scott King and Barbara Reynolds
https://www.npr.org/2009/03/15/101719889/before-rosa-parks-there-was-claudette-colvin
https://www.womenshistory.org/education-resources/biographies/mary-edwards-walker
https://www.womenshistory.org/education-resources/biographies/nellie-bly
https://www.ncu.edu/blog/national-women%E2%80%99s-history-month-female-leaders-education#gref
https://www.history.com/topics/womens-history/florence-nightingale-1
Coretta Scott King
Okay, you’ve probably heard of Coretta Scott King. She was the wife of the Civil Rights leader Martin Luther King, Jr. But Coretta Scott King not only helped her husband and played a huge part in the Civil Rights movement, she also had numerous other accomplishments; establishing the King Center and Martin Luther King, Jr. Day, fighting for the end of apartheid in South Africa, helping to close the employment gap in the US, and fighting for women’s rights and LGBTQ+ rights.
Claudette Colvin
Everyone knows the story of Rosa Parks - how she refused to give up her seat on a bus, how she got arrested. This is also the story of 15 year old Claudette Colvin, who refused to get up on the bus for a white man because it was her constitutional right, and ended up arrested. And she did this a whole 9 months before Rosa Parks. Commenting on the incident, she said that “my head was just too full of black history, you know, the oppression that we went through. It felt like Sojourner Truth was on one side pushing me down, and Harriet Tubman was on the other side of me pushing me down. I couldn't get up.”
Mary Edwards Walker
The Presidential Medal of Honor has been given countless times, but in all of US History, only one woman has been awarded this medal; Mary Edwards Walker. Her parents insisted that she get the same schooling as her brothers, and eventually saved up enough money to attend Syracuse Medical School. She began a medical practice, and when she wasn’t allowed to join the Union’s efforts in the Civil War, she volunteered as a nurse. She started treating soldiers on the front lines. Eventually, in 1863, she became the first female surgeon. She was held as a prisoner of war for four months, and refused to wear the womens clothes they provided her - she wore men’s clothes because they were more comfortable and hygienic. After the war, she was awarded the Presidential Medal of Honor by President Andrew Johnson.
Nellie Bly
When Nellie Bly, a journalist for New York World, wanted to write an article about the experiences of immigrants in the United States, the editor declined her story. However, he challenged her to write a piece about one of New York’s mental hospitals. She decided to fake mental illness and go inside the institution and expose how patients were treated. Her six-part installment, Ten Days in a Mad House, quickly made her one of the most famous journalists in the United States. But her adventure didn’t end there - later, she travelled the world in 72 days, which led her to gain a world record.
Margaret Bancroft
Bancroft was a female leader of education in the late 1800s. At just 29 years old, she opened the first private boarding school in New Jersey for children with disabilities, called the Haddonfield School for the Mentally Deficient and Peculiarly Backward (later renamed the Bancroft Training School). This school offered programs that were tailored to the specific needs of the children, and students were given all the necessities, recreational activities and trips, and lessons for their mental ages. She was very ahead of the time, and laid the framework for special education.
Florence Nightingale (163)
Ever since Florence Nightingale was a young girl, she knew that she wanted to be a nurse. During the Crimean War, hospitals in England were understaffed due to their refusal to hire female nurses - but after the War of Alma, they decided to hire female nurses to tend to the injured and ill. The Secretary of War, Sidney Herbert, reached out to Nightingale, so she formed a group of 34 nurses and went to Crimea. Nightingale procured equipment, and spent all of her time caring for the soldiers. Her work in reducing the hospital’s death rates by two-thirds earned her the titles of “the Lady with the Lamp” and “the Angel of the Crimea.” Afterwards, in 1860, she funded the Nightingale Training School for Nurses. Even after being affected by a disease she had contracted during the Crimean War that left her bedridden, she continued to work, publishing a book on how to run civilian hospitals and giving advice throughout the US Civil War. In 1908, she received the merit of honor by King Edward.
Image Link: https://www.plannedparenthood.org/planned-parenthood-pacific-southwest/blog/national-womens-history-month-2
My Life, My Love, My Legacy by Coretta Scott King and Barbara Reynolds
https://www.npr.org/2009/03/15/101719889/before-rosa-parks-there-was-claudette-colvin
https://www.womenshistory.org/education-resources/biographies/mary-edwards-walker
https://www.womenshistory.org/education-resources/biographies/nellie-bly
https://www.ncu.edu/blog/national-women%E2%80%99s-history-month-female-leaders-education#gref
https://www.history.com/topics/womens-history/florence-nightingale-1