By: Katie Giannetto
Women empower other women all around the world. Women can do whatever they set their minds to, there’s proof within our history. Here are 15 women that empower me, I hope they empower you too.
Supreme Court Justice: Sandra Day O’Connor
This is by far one of the most influential women out there. Sandra Day O’Connor was the first woman to serve as a Supreme Court Justice. She served from 1981-2006 and was appointed by President Ronald Reagan. She grew up in El Paso, Texas and her parents owned a cattle ranch in Southeastern Arizona. She attended Stanford University and got a BA in Economics and then attended Stanford University Law School. During her time in college she was the Senior Class President at Stanford and later became a member of the board of editors for the Stanford Law Review. Due to prejudice against women at the time, it was very hard for her to find a job until she had a no pay job as a deputy county attorney in San Mateo, California. After moving to Germany with her new husband John Jay O’Connor, she worked as a civilian attorney specializing in contracts. O’Connor’s return to Arizona led to her working as Arizona’s assistant attorneys general. She later became the first woman state senator. Two years later, she left the state senate and legislature to enter the judicial branch of government. O’Connor became the founder of both the Arizona Women Lawyers Association and the Nation Association of Judges. O’Connor soon became the first female justice in history in 1981. She was an independent thinker and leader on the court and made many historical decisions during her time.
Landowner & Lawyer: Margaret Brent
Margaret Brent settled in Maryland in 1638. Her and her sister never married, which was unusual for the time. Leonard Calvert, Governor of Maryland did not return to his colony for over a year after fleeing to Virginia and suddenly died in late 1646. He appointed Thomas Green as Governor and made Margaret Brent his executor saying, “take all, pay all.” January 26, 1648, in the House of St. John’s, she asked the Governor and assembly to admit her with two votes. One as landowner and one as Lord Baltimore’s attorney. She was of course refused but was determined to not give up. She used her power as Lord Baltimore’s attorney to begin selling cattle in order to pay off the soldiers. This of course ended in the anger of Lord Baltimore but prevented an uprising within Maryland. Although Lord Baltimore was furious, the assembly defended her. She soon moved to Virginia and acquired a large sum of land naming it “Peace,” and lived there until her death in 1671. Although she did not succeed in becoming the first woman to vote, she was a highly dedicated landowner and lawyer who worked behind the scenes to save the state of Maryland.
Chemist: Rosalind Franklin
Rosalind Franklin, born in 1920 is a British Scientist and Chemist best known for her contributions to the discovery of the molecular structure of deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA) and contributed to new insight on viruses. She studied physical chemistry at Newnham College, University of Cambridge. She graduated in 1941 and received a fellowship to conduct research in physical chemistry at Cambridge. Due to the advance of World War II, she changed her course of action and turned down the fellowship to serve as a London Air Raid Warden and worked for the British Coal Utilisation Research Association. She investigated the physical chemistry of carbon and coal for the war effort. She used this research for her doctoral thesis and in 1945 she received her doctorate from Cambridge. She then worked with Jacques Méring from 1947-1950 at the State Chemical Laboratory in Paris where she studied X-ray diffraction technology. In 1951, Franklin joined the Biophysical Laboratory at King’s College in London as a research fellow. She applied X-ray diffraction methods to the study of DNA. Her work with X-ray patterns of DNA molecules laid the foundation for James Watson and Francis Crick’s research. Franklin worked in the Crystallography Laboratory at Birkbeck College in London. She completed her work of coals, DNA, viruses, and collaborated on studying RNA. Her research was halted by her untimely death in 1958 due to cancer.
Mathematician: Katherine Johnson
Katherine Johnson is a mathematician who got her BS in Mathematics and French at West Virginia State College in 1937. Johnson and two men were selected to be the first black students to be offered spots at the state's flagship school, West Virginia University. After leaving to start a family, she returned to teaching. In 1952, she and her family moved to Newport News, Virginia to pursue an opportunity at the all-black West Area Computing Section at the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics' (NACA’s) Langley Laboratory. In 1957, she provided some of the math for the 1958 document Notes on Space Technology, a compendium of a series of 1958 lectures given by engineers in the Flight Research Division and the Pilotless Aircraft Research Division (PARD). She had contributed to some great accomplishments at NASA and would often be asked to run the same numbers in the computer by hand to ensure that the astronauts were ready to take flight. When asked about her greatest contribution to NASA, Johnson talks about the calculations that helped with the Apollo Lunar Module with the lunar-orbiting Command and Service Module. She retired in 1986. In 2015 at 97 years old, President Barack Obama awarded her the Presidential Medal of Freedom, America’s Highest Civilian Honor. She died on February 24, 2020.
Physicist and Chemist: Marie Curie
She was born in Warsaw in 1867 and received general education in local schools and scientific training from her father. She received Licenciateships in Physics and the Mathematical Sciences at Sorbonne Paris. She soon became head of the Physics Laboratory at the Sorbonne and gained her Doctor of Science degree in 1903. After the passing of her late husband Pierre Curie in 1906, she took his place as Professor of General Physics in the Faculty of Sciences, which was the first time a woman had ever held this position. She became Director of the Curie Laboratory in the Radium Institute of the University of Paris which was founded in 1914. Curie developed methods for the separation of radium from radioactive residues. She was a member of Conseil du Physique Solvay from 1911 to 1934. She was also a member of the Committee of Intellectual Co-operation of the League of Nations from 1922 to 1934. Her work is recorded in numerous papers in numerous papers in scientific journals. She received many honorary science, medicine, and law degrees. She was awarded the Nobel Prize for Physics in 1903 for her study with her husband into spontaneous radiation. She received a second Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 1911 for her work involving radioactivity. She received the Davy Medal for Royal Society with her husband in 1903. In 1921, President Harding presented her with one gram of radium in recognition of her service to science. She died in Savoy, France due to a small illness in 1934.
Finance: Muriel Siebert
Muriel Siebert or “Mickie” was a fearless Wall Street broker and known as the first woman of finance. She became the first woman to own a seat at the New York Stock Exchange and the first woman to head one of NYSE’s member firms. She joined the 1,365 male members in 1967. Although she did not have a college degree, she very quickly became a big name on Wall Street. She attended Western Reserve University in 1949 and took business classes but was the only girl there. She had to leave school early due to her father’s illness in 1952. She moved to New York two years later and lied about having a college degree in order to work on Wall Street. She changed her job three times due to men being paid significantly higher for doing the same work. In 1969 she started her company, Muriel Siebert & Company. Governor Hugh L. Carey selected her to become New York’s first female superintendent of banking in 1977. She started the Siebert Entrepreneurial Philanthropic Plan in 1990 to help buyers to give to charity. She was inducted into the Women’s National Hall of Fame in 1994. Four years later, she became the president for the New York Women’s Agenda. She received an honorary doctorate degree from Wagner College in 2010 and has been given 17 doctorates. She never married or had kids. She died in 2013 and after her death the New York Stock Exchange named Siebert Hall after her, which is the first time a room at the stock exchange has been named after someone.
Accountant: Mary Harris Smith
Mary Harris Smith is the first woman to become an accountant. In 1891, she applied to join ICAEW as a fellow but was denied because she is a woman. After Parliament passed the Sex Disqualification (Removal) Act in December 1919, she applied again. In 1920 at the age of 75 she was admitted as a fellow. This was after 29 years of persistence. She became the world’s first female Chartered Accountant. She spent most of her life fighting for equal rights for women but unfortunately died in 1934.
Physician: Elizabeth Blackwell
Elizabeth Blackwell is the first woman to receive a medical degree and ultimately opened her own college so women can pursue a medical degree. She was inspired to pursue a medical degree by her dying friend who said her ordeal would have been better if she had a female physician. There were very few medical schools at the time and none accepted women. Most male physicians trained as apprentices and very few women did but became unlicensed physicians. Blackwell ended up boarding with families of two southern physicians who mentored her. She returned to Philadelphia in 1847 hoping that her Quaker friends could assist her entrance into medical school. She was rejected everywhere she applied but she ultimately admitted into Geneva College but her acceptance letter was intended as a practical joke. Blackwell faced discrimination and obstacles in college but ended up graduating first of her class in 1849. She continued her training in London and Paris hospitals but doctors regulated her to midwifery or nursing. In 1851, she returned to New York City where discrimination against female physicians meant few patients and difficulty practicing in hospitals and clinics. She received help from Quaker friends and opened a small clinic to help treat poor women. In 1857, she opened the New York Infirmary for Women and Children with her sister Dr. Emily Blackwell and colleague Dr. Marie Zakrzewska. In 1868, Blackwell opened a medical college in New York City and a year later she placed her sister in charge so she could return to London. In 1875, she became a professor of gynecology at the new London School of Medicine for Women.
Politician/Women’s Rights Activist: Elizabeth Cady Stanton
Stanton received her education at Johnstown Academy and at Emma Willard's Troy Female Seminary in New York. Her father was a noted lawyer and state assemblyman. In 1848, Stanton and Lucretia Mott held the first Woman’s Rights Convention at Seneca Falls, New York. When Stanton and Susan B. Anthony met in 1851, they made many speeches, articles, and books together. In 1862 Stanton moved to New York City and advocated for the 13th amendment with Anthony. Her speeches addressed such topics as maternity, child rearing, divorce law, married women’s property rights, temperance, abolition, and presidential campaigns. She and Anthony opposed the 14th and 15th amendments to the US Constitution and prompted them to create the National Woman’s Suffrage Association (NWSA) in 1869. Stanton edited and wrote for the NWSA’s journal, The Revolution. She later died in 1902, 18 years before women got the right to vote.
Journalism: Ann Smith Franklin
Franklin is the wife of James Franklin, who is the brother of Benjamin Franklin. James Franklin was the printer and publisher of The New England Courant. James’ hostility towards the church and government resulted in a jail term for publishing his newspaper. Once out of jail, he had to cease printing The Courant and the publication of the newspaper was passed down to his younger brother, Benjamin Franklin. James and Ann moved to Rhode Island and launched Rhode Island Gazette. James died in 1735 after a long illness leaving Ann with the responsibility of supporting her four young children on her own. She soon became the official printer of the General Assembly. She revived the profitable Rhode Island Almanac which James had begun in 1727. From 1739-1741 Ann edited and printed this second series, becoming the first woman in America to write an almanac. In 1741, Ann ceased publication of the Rhode Island Almanac and began selling her brother-in-law’s more successful, Poor Richard’s Almanac. In 1748, her son James and Ann paired together to publish the Newport Mercury before his tragic passing. As she grew older, she started easing herself out of the publication business but at the age of sixty-five, she returned full time to the printing press. She continued to write for the Newport Mercury, which still exists today, until her death in 1763.
Women in Business
Eliza Lucas Pinckney owned the business of agriculture. In 1739, her mother died and her father returned to his military post, leaving Eliza at sixteen in charge of three family plantations. She started experimenting with the indigo plant, the textile industry used for dyes, in 1739. After three years of failed attempts, she proved that indigo could be successfully grown in South Carolina. She proved that colonial planters could make a profit in the extremely competitive market. Indigo soon became second only to rice as South Carolina’s cash crop, and contributed greatly to the wealth of its planters. In 1744, Eliza got married and started a family. She found time to raise her family, continue her agricultural business, and found time to spy for the colonial army during the Revolutionary War. President George Washington asked to be a pallbearer at Eliza’s funeral in 1793. The membership of South Carolina Business Hall of Fame inducted Eliza into their fellowship in 1989, the first woman to be honored.
Mary Katherine Goddard was a journalist, printer, and publisher. She was very active in her family’s publishing business and Mary and her mother were a mother/daughter team establishing a popular printing and publishing business. When her mother died in 1770, she left the business to Mary. She managed the monumental project of printing the first copy of the Declaration of Independence that included the signers’ names. Although the business technically belonged to her brother, she ran everything. She published Baltimore’s first newspaper The Maryland Journal. A year later, she was officially named publisher of the newspaper. Her brother William wasn’t as successful and was jealous of his sister’s business. In 1784, Mary’s name disappeared from the newspaper. Records indicate she filed five lawsuits against him. In 1789, she became the first woman in America to open a bookstore and spent the remaining years of her life running the shop in Baltimore.
Rebecca Lukens owned the business of iron and steel manufacturing. She was the owner and manager of the iron steel mill that grew into the Lukens Steel Company of Coatesville, Pennsylvania. Rebecca Luken inherited the business from her late husband in 1825, becoming the first woman in the United States in the iron industry and the first female chief executive officer of an industrial company. By 1834, Brandywine Mill was a leader in the production of boilerplate for iron-hulled steamboats and railroads. She soon opened a store, warehouse and freight agency. She successfully steered her company through the national financial crisis, the Panic of 1837. In 1994, Fortune magazine posthumously crowned Lukens “America’s First Female CEO of an Industrial Company” and named her to the National Business Hall of Fame.
Mary Laveau owned a hair salon and was the Voodoo Queen of New Orleans. When she became a hairdresser her clients were wealthy white socialites, which allowed her to be privy to the rumors and gossip in the French Quarters. By 1830, she was one of many Voodoo Queens, but she was deemed most powerful. Voodoo thrived as a business, served as a form of political influence, and provided a source of entertainment. She was the first Voodoo Queen specializing in romance and finance. All-knowing and all-powerful, she had great influence over her multiracial clientele, respected and feared by all. She introduced holy water, incense and Catholic prayers into the African-based Voodoo rites. Marie Laveau continues to be a central figure of Louisiana Voodoo and of New Orleans culture.Women empower other women all around the world. Women can do whatever they set their minds to, there’s proof within our history. Here are 15 women that empower me, I hope they empower you too.
Supreme Court Justice: Sandra Day O’Connor
This is by far one of the most influential women out there. Sandra Day O’Connor was the first woman to serve as a Supreme Court Justice. She served from 1981-2006 and was appointed by President Ronald Reagan. She grew up in El Paso, Texas and her parents owned a cattle ranch in Southeastern Arizona. She attended Stanford University and got a BA in Economics and then attended Stanford University Law School. During her time in college she was the Senior Class President at Stanford and later became a member of the board of editors for the Stanford Law Review. Due to prejudice against women at the time, it was very hard for her to find a job until she had a no pay job as a deputy county attorney in San Mateo, California. After moving to Germany with her new husband John Jay O’Connor, she worked as a civilian attorney specializing in contracts. O’Connor’s return to Arizona led to her working as Arizona’s assistant attorneys general. She later became the first woman state senator. Two years later, she left the state senate and legislature to enter the judicial branch of government. O’Connor became the founder of both the Arizona Women Lawyers Association and the Nation Association of Judges. O’Connor soon became the first female justice in history in 1981. She was an independent thinker and leader on the court and made many historical decisions during her time.
Landowner & Lawyer: Margaret Brent
Margaret Brent settled in Maryland in 1638. Her and her sister never married, which was unusual for the time. Leonard Calvert, Governor of Maryland did not return to his colony for over a year after fleeing to Virginia and suddenly died in late 1646. He appointed Thomas Green as Governor and made Margaret Brent his executor saying, “take all, pay all.” January 26, 1648, in the House of St. John’s, she asked the Governor and assembly to admit her with two votes. One as landowner and one as Lord Baltimore’s attorney. She was of course refused but was determined to not give up. She used her power as Lord Baltimore’s attorney to begin selling cattle in order to pay off the soldiers. This of course ended in the anger of Lord Baltimore but prevented an uprising within Maryland. Although Lord Baltimore was furious, the assembly defended her. She soon moved to Virginia and acquired a large sum of land naming it “Peace,” and lived there until her death in 1671. Although she did not succeed in becoming the first woman to vote, she was a highly dedicated landowner and lawyer who worked behind the scenes to save the state of Maryland.
Chemist: Rosalind Franklin
Rosalind Franklin, born in 1920 is a British Scientist and Chemist best known for her contributions to the discovery of the molecular structure of deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA) and contributed to new insight on viruses. She studied physical chemistry at Newnham College, University of Cambridge. She graduated in 1941 and received a fellowship to conduct research in physical chemistry at Cambridge. Due to the advance of World War II, she changed her course of action and turned down the fellowship to serve as a London Air Raid Warden and worked for the British Coal Utilisation Research Association. She investigated the physical chemistry of carbon and coal for the war effort. She used this research for her doctoral thesis and in 1945 she received her doctorate from Cambridge. She then worked with Jacques Méring from 1947-1950 at the State Chemical Laboratory in Paris where she studied X-ray diffraction technology. In 1951, Franklin joined the Biophysical Laboratory at King’s College in London as a research fellow. She applied X-ray diffraction methods to the study of DNA. Her work with X-ray patterns of DNA molecules laid the foundation for James Watson and Francis Crick’s research. Franklin worked in the Crystallography Laboratory at Birkbeck College in London. She completed her work of coals, DNA, viruses, and collaborated on studying RNA. Her research was halted by her untimely death in 1958 due to cancer.
Mathematician: Katherine Johnson
Katherine Johnson is a mathematician who got her BS in Mathematics and French at West Virginia State College in 1937. Johnson and two men were selected to be the first black students to be offered spots at the state's flagship school, West Virginia University. After leaving to start a family, she returned to teaching. In 1952, she and her family moved to Newport News, Virginia to pursue an opportunity at the all-black West Area Computing Section at the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics' (NACA’s) Langley Laboratory. In 1957, she provided some of the math for the 1958 document Notes on Space Technology, a compendium of a series of 1958 lectures given by engineers in the Flight Research Division and the Pilotless Aircraft Research Division (PARD). She had contributed to some great accomplishments at NASA and would often be asked to run the same numbers in the computer by hand to ensure that the astronauts were ready to take flight. When asked about her greatest contribution to NASA, Johnson talks about the calculations that helped with the Apollo Lunar Module with the lunar-orbiting Command and Service Module. She retired in 1986. In 2015 at 97 years old, President Barack Obama awarded her the Presidential Medal of Freedom, America’s Highest Civilian Honor. She died on February 24, 2020.
Physicist and Chemist: Marie Curie
She was born in Warsaw in 1867 and received general education in local schools and scientific training from her father. She received Licenciateships in Physics and the Mathematical Sciences at Sorbonne Paris. She soon became head of the Physics Laboratory at the Sorbonne and gained her Doctor of Science degree in 1903. After the passing of her late husband Pierre Curie in 1906, she took his place as Professor of General Physics in the Faculty of Sciences, which was the first time a woman had ever held this position. She became Director of the Curie Laboratory in the Radium Institute of the University of Paris which was founded in 1914. Curie developed methods for the separation of radium from radioactive residues. She was a member of Conseil du Physique Solvay from 1911 to 1934. She was also a member of the Committee of Intellectual Co-operation of the League of Nations from 1922 to 1934. Her work is recorded in numerous papers in numerous papers in scientific journals. She received many honorary science, medicine, and law degrees. She was awarded the Nobel Prize for Physics in 1903 for her study with her husband into spontaneous radiation. She received a second Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 1911 for her work involving radioactivity. She received the Davy Medal for Royal Society with her husband in 1903. In 1921, President Harding presented her with one gram of radium in recognition of her service to science. She died in Savoy, France due to a small illness in 1934.
Finance: Muriel Siebert
Muriel Siebert or “Mickie” was a fearless Wall Street broker and known as the first woman of finance. She became the first woman to own a seat at the New York Stock Exchange and the first woman to head one of NYSE’s member firms. She joined the 1,365 male members in 1967. Although she did not have a college degree, she very quickly became a big name on Wall Street. She attended Western Reserve University in 1949 and took business classes but was the only girl there. She had to leave school early due to her father’s illness in 1952. She moved to New York two years later and lied about having a college degree in order to work on Wall Street. She changed her job three times due to men being paid significantly higher for doing the same work. In 1969 she started her company, Muriel Siebert & Company. Governor Hugh L. Carey selected her to become New York’s first female superintendent of banking in 1977. She started the Siebert Entrepreneurial Philanthropic Plan in 1990 to help buyers to give to charity. She was inducted into the Women’s National Hall of Fame in 1994. Four years later, she became the president for the New York Women’s Agenda. She received an honorary doctorate degree from Wagner College in 2010 and has been given 17 doctorates. She never married or had kids. She died in 2013 and after her death the New York Stock Exchange named Siebert Hall after her, which is the first time a room at the stock exchange has been named after someone.
Accountant: Mary Harris Smith
Mary Harris Smith is the first woman to become an accountant. In 1891, she applied to join ICAEW as a fellow but was denied because she is a woman. After Parliament passed the Sex Disqualification (Removal) Act in December 1919, she applied again. In 1920 at the age of 75 she was admitted as a fellow. This was after 29 years of persistence. She became the world’s first female Chartered Accountant. She spent most of her life fighting for equal rights for women but unfortunately died in 1934.
Physician: Elizabeth Blackwell
Elizabeth Blackwell is the first woman to receive a medical degree and ultimately opened her own college so women can pursue a medical degree. She was inspired to pursue a medical degree by her dying friend who said her ordeal would have been better if she had a female physician. There were very few medical schools at the time and none accepted women. Most male physicians trained as apprentices and very few women did but became unlicensed physicians. Blackwell ended up boarding with families of two southern physicians who mentored her. She returned to Philadelphia in 1847 hoping that her Quaker friends could assist her entrance into medical school. She was rejected everywhere she applied but she ultimately admitted into Geneva College but her acceptance letter was intended as a practical joke. Blackwell faced discrimination and obstacles in college but ended up graduating first of her class in 1849. She continued her training in London and Paris hospitals but doctors regulated her to midwifery or nursing. In 1851, she returned to New York City where discrimination against female physicians meant few patients and difficulty practicing in hospitals and clinics. She received help from Quaker friends and opened a small clinic to help treat poor women. In 1857, she opened the New York Infirmary for Women and Children with her sister Dr. Emily Blackwell and colleague Dr. Marie Zakrzewska. In 1868, Blackwell opened a medical college in New York City and a year later she placed her sister in charge so she could return to London. In 1875, she became a professor of gynecology at the new London School of Medicine for Women.
Politician/Women’s Rights Activist: Elizabeth Cady Stanton
Stanton received her education at Johnstown Academy and at Emma Willard's Troy Female Seminary in New York. Her father was a noted lawyer and state assemblyman. In 1848, Stanton and Lucretia Mott held the first Woman’s Rights Convention at Seneca Falls, New York. When Stanton and Susan B. Anthony met in 1851, they made many speeches, articles, and books together. In 1862 Stanton moved to New York City and advocated for the 13th amendment with Anthony. Her speeches addressed such topics as maternity, child rearing, divorce law, married women’s property rights, temperance, abolition, and presidential campaigns. She and Anthony opposed the 14th and 15th amendments to the US Constitution and prompted them to create the National Woman’s Suffrage Association (NWSA) in 1869. Stanton edited and wrote for the NWSA’s journal, The Revolution. She later died in 1902, 18 years before women got the right to vote.
Journalism: Ann Smith Franklin
Franklin is the wife of James Franklin, who is the brother of Benjamin Franklin. James Franklin was the printer and publisher of The New England Courant. James’ hostility towards the church and government resulted in a jail term for publishing his newspaper. Once out of jail, he had to cease printing The Courant and the publication of the newspaper was passed down to his younger brother, Benjamin Franklin. James and Ann moved to Rhode Island and launched Rhode Island Gazette. James died in 1735 after a long illness leaving Ann with the responsibility of supporting her four young children on her own. She soon became the official printer of the General Assembly. She revived the profitable Rhode Island Almanac which James had begun in 1727. From 1739-1741 Ann edited and printed this second series, becoming the first woman in America to write an almanac. In 1741, Ann ceased publication of the Rhode Island Almanac and began selling her brother-in-law’s more successful, Poor Richard’s Almanac. In 1748, her son James and Ann paired together to publish the Newport Mercury before his tragic passing. As she grew older, she started easing herself out of the publication business but at the age of sixty-five, she returned full time to the printing press. She continued to write for the Newport Mercury, which still exists today, until her death in 1763.
Women in Business
Eliza Lucas Pinckney owned the business of agriculture. In 1739, her mother died and her father returned to his military post, leaving Eliza at sixteen in charge of three family plantations. She started experimenting with the indigo plant, the textile industry used for dyes, in 1739. After three years of failed attempts, she proved that indigo could be successfully grown in South Carolina. She proved that colonial planters could make a profit in the extremely competitive market. Indigo soon became second only to rice as South Carolina’s cash crop, and contributed greatly to the wealth of its planters. In 1744, Eliza got married and started a family. She found time to raise her family, continue her agricultural business, and found time to spy for the colonial army during the Revolutionary War. President George Washington asked to be a pallbearer at Eliza’s funeral in 1793. The membership of South Carolina Business Hall of Fame inducted Eliza into their fellowship in 1989, the first woman to be honored.
Mary Katherine Goddard was a journalist, printer, and publisher. She was very active in her family’s publishing business and Mary and her mother were a mother/daughter team establishing a popular printing and publishing business. When her mother died in 1770, she left the business to Mary. She managed the monumental project of printing the first copy of the Declaration of Independence that included the signers’ names. Although the business technically belonged to her brother, she ran everything. She published Baltimore’s first newspaper The Maryland Journal. A year later, she was officially named publisher of the newspaper. Her brother William wasn’t as successful and was jealous of his sister’s business. In 1784, Mary’s name disappeared from the newspaper. Records indicate she filed five lawsuits against him. In 1789, she became the first woman in America to open a bookstore and spent the remaining years of her life running the shop in Baltimore.
Rebecca Lukens owned the business of iron and steel manufacturing. She was the owner and manager of the iron steel mill that grew into the Lukens Steel Company of Coatesville, Pennsylvania. Rebecca Luken inherited the business from her late husband in 1825, becoming the first woman in the United States in the iron industry and the first female chief executive officer of an industrial company. By 1834, Brandywine Mill was a leader in the production of boilerplate for iron-hulled steamboats and railroads. She soon opened a store, warehouse and freight agency. She successfully steered her company through the national financial crisis, the Panic of 1837. In 1994, Fortune magazine posthumously crowned Lukens “America’s First Female CEO of an Industrial Company” and named her to the National Business Hall of Fame.
Mary Laveau owned a hair salon and was the Voodoo Queen of New Orleans. When she became a hairdresser her clients were wealthy white socialites, which allowed her to be privy to the rumors and gossip in the French Quarters. By 1830, she was one of many Voodoo Queens, but she was deemed most powerful. Voodoo thrived as a business, served as a form of political influence, and provided a source of entertainment. She was the first Voodoo Queen specializing in romance and finance. All-knowing and all-powerful, she had great influence over her multiracial clientele, respected and feared by all. She introduced holy water, incense and Catholic prayers into the African-based Voodoo rites. Marie Laveau continues to be a central figure of Louisiana Voodoo and of New Orleans culture.
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