Today in Women�s History

April 24th:

1847: Susan Dimock born

1905 (or 1902?): Helen Tamiris born

April 26th:

1777: Learning that the British were burning Danbury, Connecticut, 16-year-old Sybil Luddington rode 40 miles from New York to Connecticut, rallying her father's militia and earning her in history the nickname "the female Paul Revere"

1795: Frances Manwaring Caulkins born

1820: Alice Cary born

1828: Martha Finley born

1836: Erminnie Adele Platt Smithborn

1860: Mary Raphael Schenck Woolman born

1875: Natalie Curtis (Burlin) born

1882: Jessie Redmon Fauset born

1886: Gertrude Pridgett Rainey born

1893: Anita Loos born

April 28th:

1882?: Frances Elliott Davis born

1931: Women's track and field events approved for Olympics

April 30th:

1662: Mary II of Great Britain born

1789: Martha Dandridge Custis Washington becomes the first First Lady of the United States, though the title First Lady was not in use during her lifetime.

1838: Abba Louisa Goold Woolson born

1858: Mary Scott Lord Dimmick Harrison born

1871: Louise Dilworth Beatty Homer born

1877: Alice B. Toklas born

1898: Katherine Amelia Towle born

May 2nd:

1676: Mary Rowlandson released from her captivity by Indians in King Philip's War. Her tale of this captivity, published in 1682, is the first in the genre of captivity narratives.

1858: Edith Anna Oenone Somerville born (writer)

1864: Alice Bertha Kroeger born (librarian)

1878?: Nannie Helen Burroughs (educator)

May 4th:

1749: Charlotte Smith born (English writer, poet, author of Emmeline)

1820: Julia Gardiner Tyler born ( U.S. First Lady)

1884: Agnes Fay Morgan born (nutritionist, chemist)

1898: Joy Bright Hancock born (aviator, naval officer)

1907: Mary Hallaren born (Army officer)

1970: Dawn Staley born (basketball player, coach)

1979: Margaret Thatcher becomes Britain's first woman Prime Minister as the Conservative Party wins the general election.

May 6th:

1805: Eliza Jane Gillet Bridgman born

1829: Phebe Ann Coffin Hanaford born (minister, writer, reformer)

1831: Mary Clemmer Ames born (journalist, originator of the title "First Lady" for wives of U.S. Presidents)

1858: Alice Blanchard Merriam Coleman born

1882: Ann Haven Morgan born (biologist, educator)

May 8th:

1429: Joan of Arc led French troops in the siege of Orleans




1830: Harriet Lane Johnston born (or May 9?) (White House hostess, President James Buchanan's administration)




1835: Augusta Jane Evans Wilson born (writer). Some of her works can be read here http://www.gutenberg.org/browse/authors/e#a1399



"...She was born Augusta Jane Evans on May 8, 1835 in Wynnton (now MidTown (Columbus, Georgia)), Georgia. As a young girl in 19th-century America she received little in the way of a formal education. However, she became a voracious reader at an early age. Her unfortunate father, Matthew Evans, lost the family's rich property of Sherwood Hall to bankruptcy in the 1840s. He moved his family of 10 from Georgia to San Antonio, Texas, in 1845.

Evans’ time there would inspire her first published literary work. In 1850 at the age of 15 she wrote "Inez: A Tale of the Alamo", a sentimental, moralistic, anti-Catholic love story. It told the story of one orphan's spiritual journey from religious skepticism to devout faith. She presented the manuscript to her father as a Christmas gift in 1854. It was published anonymously in 1855.

However, life in a frontier border town like San Antonio proved dangerous, especially with the Mexican-American War. Later Evans' parents moved her to Mobile, Alabama. She wrote her next novel at age 18 which was called Beulah. It was published in 1859. Beulah began the theme of female education in her novels. It sold well selling over 22,000 copies during its first year of publication. This was a staggering accomplishment. It established her as Alabama's first professional author. Her family used the proceeds from her literary success to purchase Georgia Cottage on Springhill Avenue.

When most of the Southern states declared their independence and seceded from the Union into the Confederate States of America, Augusta Evans became a staunch Southern patriot. She became active in the subsequent Civil War as a propagandist. Evans was engaged to a New York journalist named James Reed Spalding. But she broke off the engagement in 1860 because he supported Abraham Lincoln. She nursed sick and wounded Confederate soldiers at Fort Morgan on Mobile Bay. Evans also visited Confederate soldiers at Chickamauga. She also sewed sandbags for the defense of the community, wrote patriotic addresses, and set up a hospital near her residence. The hospital was dubbed Camp Beulah by local admirers in honor of her novel. She also corresponded with general P.G.T. de Beauregard in 1862....Wilson wrote in the domestic sentimental style of the Victorian Age. Feminist critics have chosen to read past the marital games of her works to focus on the intellectual competence of her female characters which allow them to gain both personal and public power. Of "St. Elmo" one critic maintained, "the trouble with the heroine of St. Elmo was that she swallowed an unabridged dictionary." Wilson was the first American woman author to earn over $100,000. This would be a record unsurpassed until Edith Wharton...." http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Augusta_Jane_Evans

1847: Clara Marshall born (physician, educator)



"...Dr. Clara Marshall was the first woman appointed to the staff of the Blockley Medical College for Men (part of the Philadelphia Hospital at Blockely), and was among the first women to receive a staff appointment at a charitable or correctional institution. As dean from 1886 to 1917, she helped expand and modernize the Woman's Medical College of Pennsylvania and became a powerful role model for women entering medicine...." http://www.nlm.nih.gov/changingthefaceofmedicine/physicians/biography_214.html

1870: Georgia Lydia Stevens born (musician, educator)


"...In March 1914, Georgia went to the Motherhouse in Ixelles, Belgium for her probation and in September of 1914 set sail for the United States and Manhattanville, where she would spend the rest of her life. In response to the Motu Proprio of Pius X on sacred music, Mother Stevens established the Pius X School of Liturgical Music at Manhattanville College of the Sacred Heart in 1916. From 1916 until her sudden death in 1946, Mother Stevens directed all aspects of the School. The Pius X School was responsible for producing the Pius X Hymnal and several recordings; the School flourished for fifty years and produced hundreds of pastoral musicians. Mother Stevens also wrote several books on Gregorian Chant and sacred music...." http://www.findagrave.com/cgi-bin/fg.cgi?page=gr&GRid=84607481

1910: Mary Lou Williams born (pianist, composer, arranger)




1914: President Woodrow Wilson declares Mother's Day a national holiday in the U.S.

1955: Maud Wood Park died (suffragist)

May 10th:

1800: Sarah Anne Worthington King Peter born (philanthropist)

1840: Elizabeth Cady married Henry Brewster Stanton, omitting the word "obey" form the ceremony

1840: Elizabeth Cady married Henry Brewster Stanton, omitting the word "obey" form the ceremony

1872: Madeline McDowell Breckinridge born (reformer, suffragist) born (reformer, suffragist)

1919: Ella Grasso born (public official)

"...A Connecticut native, Ella Grasso is best-known for being the first elected female governor of the state. Grasso served two terms in the United States Congress from 1970-74, and after not seeking reelection, she instead ran for governor in Connecticut. She won the election, and ended up winning a reelection bid in 1978. Grasso gained acclaim for her handling of the “Blizzard of 1978” with her closing of the state during the storm.

She was also instrumental as a proponent of building the Hartford Civic Center to bring more life into the city, and was also in favor of rebuilding the arena following the collapse of the roof in January 1978. In late 1980, Grasso was diagnosed with cancer and forced to resign from her post as governor, passing away just several weeks later at the age of 61.

Grasso has earned several notable honors posthumously, including her being awarded the Presidential Medal of Honor by President Ronald Reagan, and she was also inducted into the National Women’s Hall of Fame and the Connecticut Women’s Hall of Fame. Grasso was also included in the inaugural class of the Hartford Whalers Hall of Fame for her support of the building and the team in 1989...." http://www.cthockeyhof.org/ella-grasso/

1944: Judith Jamison born (dancer, choreographer)



Edited by Don Quixote - 11-May-2012 at 03:27

June 4

1919   The U.S. Senate passes the Women's Suffrage bill.
1972   Black activist Angela Davis is found not guilty of murder, kidnapping, and criminal conspiracy.

1604 - Claudia de' Medici, Grand Duchess of Tuscany is born(d. 1648).
"...Claudia de' Medici (June 4, 1604 – December 25, 1648) was a daughter of Ferdinando I de' Medici, Grand Duke of Tuscany and Christina of Lorraine. She was born in Florence, and was named after her grandmother Claude of Valois, herself granddaughter of Claude, Duchess of Brittany, consort to King Francis I of France. In 1620, she married Federico Ubaldo della Rovere, the only son of Francesco Maria II della Rovere, Duke of Urbino. Their only child went on to marry the Grand Duke of Tuscany. He died suddenly on 29 June 1623. After her husband's premature death, she was married, on 19 April 1626, to Leopold V, Archduke of Austria, and thus became Archduchess consort of Austria. She died at Innsbruck in 1648. On the death of her husband, she assumed a regency in the name of her son Ferdinand Charles who was the ruler of the Princely County of Tyrol. Claudia, along with five directors, held the post until 1646. She had one child by Federico Ubaldo della Rovere: She had five children by Leopold V...."
http://www.whoislog.info/profile/claudia-de-medici.html


Edited by Don Quixote - 04-Jun-2014 at 17:30