Women You Should Know

Are you doing a class project? Want to research a woman? We are working on, and always building, a comprehensive list of interesting women for your class project. These women would make great topics for National History Day. Check them out!

Women's Topics for 2021 

The NHD project in 2021 is on the theme Communication in History. In addition to the women listed in our list. Consider these women's topics for your project:
World History
  • Origin stories and gendered expectations
  • The Book of Mary and its exclusion at the Council of Nicea
  • The Three Obediences in Chinese History or Ban Zhao's book Lessons for Women, first woman historian
  • Anna Comnena the first western woman historian
  • The Declaration of the Rights of Woman and the Female Citizen or the Bread Riots during the French Revolution
  • Women Spies-- pick a war
  • Protestant Reformation communicates the need for women's education
  • Coffee houses and intellectual conversation as progress on women's rights
  • True Womanhood and other communications on woman's role
US History
  • Puritan Women in Captivity, surviving native capture, writing about it, and the repercussions
  • Abigail Adams letter exchange with her husband
  • Fannie Wright, Angelina Grimke, and the right to speak
  • The Declaration of Sentiments as the founding document of the Woman Suffrage movement
  • Mary Beard leading women's historian, 1920s
  • Harriet E. Wilson first Black woman to publish a book
  • Harriet Jacob's published life story
  • Sojourner Truth's "Ain't I A Woman" speech
  • Elizabeth Cady Stanton's speeches on women's rights
  • Marian Anderson's singing voice and civil rights
  • Fannie Lou Hammer's charisma and leadership in civil rights
  • Convincing speeches on ERA leaders and anti-leaders
Ancient History
Americas
 
World
  • Sappho, Ancient Greek poet
  • Hekenu Iti, Egypitian artist
  • Maat Isis, Egypitian artist
  • Bastet, Egypitian artist
  • Peseshet Merit-Ptah, Egyptian physician
  • Cleopatra Zipporah, Egyptian physician
  • Tapputi-Belatikallim, Egyptian scientist
  • Queen Heutop, Egyptian leader
  • Queen Khunt, Egyptian leader
  • Queen Abah, Egyptian leader
  • Hoteb of Thebes, Egyptian leader
  • Queen Hatshepsut, Egyptian leader
  • Queen Ti, Egyptian leader
  • Queen Nefertiti (Akhnatun’s wife), Egyptian leader
 
Classical Era
Americas
 
World
  • Ban Zhao, first Chinese woman historian, author of Lessons for Women
  • Boudicca, Celtic warrior queen
  • Cleopatra, last pharaoh of Egypt
  • Maria of Alexandria, Egyptian chemist
  • Galla Placidia, Roman Empress and regent
  • Hatshepsut, Pharaoh of Egypt
  • Hypatia, martyred Egyptian-Christian philosopher and mathmetician
  • Olga of Kiev, the first saint of the Russian Orthodox Church

Middle Ages
Americas
  • Ix Chel, Mayan Moon Goddess
World
  • Aisha bint Muhammad ibn Abdul Hadi Islamic scholar, shortest chain of narrators to Muhammad
  • Amra bint Abdurrehaman, Islamic scholar
  • Anna Comnena, first western woman historian, wrote about Crusades
  • Ashifa bint Abdullah, first Muslim woman appointed market inspector
  • Fatima al-Fihriyya in Fez, Moroccan woman founded the al-Qarawwiyyin mosque
  • Fatima of Cordoba, Muslim librarian oversaw 70 public libraries
  • Banafshaa’ ar-Rumiyya, Baghdadi Muslim woman reformist
  • Hildegard of Bingen, British abbess
  • Lady Murasaki, Japanese author of the world's first novel: The Tale of Genji
  • Theodora, Empress of Byzantium, married to Justinian
  • Trota or Trotula, a medieval medical writer (probably)
 
Renaissance and Age of Exploration
Americas
  • Eleanor Dare, one of the first European women in North America
  • Dorothy May Bradford, wife of Governor William Bradford, committed suicide on the Mayflower
  • Margaret Brent, first English Colonial woman to demand the right to vote
  • Mary Johnson, first African American in the English colonies
  • Pocahontas, Algonquian princess of the Powhatan Confederacy
  • Virginia Dare, first baby of European descent born in North America
  • Weetamo, sister-in-law to Metacomet, sachem during King Philip's War
 
World
  • Aphra Behn, first woman to make a living through writing
  • Cristina Vasa, Queen of Sweeden
  • Elizabeth I, Queen of England
  • Isabella I, ruler of Spain who sponsored Christopher Columbus'
  • Jeanne d'Albret (Jeanne of Navarre), French Huguenot
  • Joan of Arc, French saint and soldier
  • Madame de Stael, intellectual and salonist
 
18th Century: Notable Women of Enlightenment and Revolutionary Eras
United States
  • Abigail Adams, American Revolutionary
  • Elizabeth Key, first Black woman to sue for her freedom and win
  • Mary Martha Washington, First First Lady of the United States
  • Mercy O. Warren, American Revolutionary author, first American historian
  • Sally Hemings, enslaved concubine of Thomas Jefferson
  • Sybil Ludington, Bostonian who did the midnight ride
World
  • Ada Lovelace, British mathematics pioneer
  • Catherine the Great, Russian Czar
  • Wollstonecraft, British mother of modern feminism
  • Olympe de Gouges, French Revolutionary
  • Sophie Germain, French mathematician

Early 19th Century: Abolition and Notable Women
United States
  • Angelina Grimke, southerner, white abolitionist, lecturer
  • Charlotte Forten Grimke, free Black, abolitionist, PFASS member
  • Elizabeth Cady Stanton, white abolitionist woman suffrage
  • Fanny Wright, first American lecturer
  • Fraces Ellen Watkins Harper, poet, Black abolitionist, and woman suffrage
  • Harriet Jacobs, free Black, abolitionist, PFASS member
  • Harriet Forten, free Black, abolitionist, PFASS member
  • Harriet Tubman, fugitive slave, soldier, and spy
  • Harriet Wilson, first American female novelist of color
  • Hetty Reckless, fugitive slave, abolitionist, PFASS member
  • Katy Ferguson, free Black, first Black female educator in America
  • Lucretia Mott, abolitionist, woman suffrage, and Seneca Falls leader
  • Lucy Stone, abolitionist, woman suffrage, founder of AWSA
  • Lydia Maria Child, white abolitionist
  • Margaretta Forten, free Black, abolitionist, PFASS member
  • Maria Stewart, free Black, abolitionist, writer
  • Maria Weston Chapman, white abolitionist organizer
  • Mary Ann Shadd Cary, Black teacher, abolitionist, and woman suffrage
  • Sarah Grimke, southerner, white abolitionist, woman lecturer
  • Sarah Louisa Forten, free Black, abolitionist, PFASS member
  • Sarah Mapps Douglass, free Black, abolitionist, PFASS member
  • Sojourner Truth, freed woman, abolitionist, and woman suffrage
  • Susan B. Anthony, white abolitionist, woman suffrage, founder of NWSA
 
World
  • Jane Austen, British author
 
Late 19th Century: Women Modernists and Notable Women
United States
  • Clara Barton, white founder of the American Red Cross in the U.S. Civil War
  • Dorothea Dix, white advocate for the mentally ill during the U.S. Civil War
  • Elizabeth Blackwell, first white American woman to graduate from medical school
  • Elizabeth Meriwether Gilmer, white journalist and first advice columnist
  • Emily Dickinson, poet
  • Emma Lazarus, white poet and essayist, known for “The New Colossus”
  • Harriet Martineau, white Whig philosopher, considered first sociologist
  • Mary Baker Eddy, white founder of Christian Science
  • Victoria Woodhall, radical, white sex-positive advocate
 
World
  • Charlotte Bronte, author
  • Cixi (Tz'u-hsi or Hsiao-ch'in), last Dowager Empress of China
  • Elizabeth Fry, British prison reform
  • Elizabeth Garrett Anderson, first British woman to graduate from medical school
  • Emily Bronte, author of Wuthering Heights
  • Florence Nightingale, British nurse and reformer
  • James Barry, medical doctor, transgendered or crossdressing, first successful cesarean section in British Empire
  • Marie Curie, Polish mother of modern physics, two-time Nobel Prize winner
  • Victoria I, Queen of England

Early 20th Century Women: Suffrage, Reform, and Notable Women
United States
  • Alice Paul, American woman suffrage, founder of NWP
  • Betty (Elizabeth) Robinson, first woman to win an Olympic Gold in Track
  • Carrie Chapman Catt, American woman suffrage
  • Carry Nation, American temperance
  • Frances Willard, American temperance activist
  • Gail Laughlin, prominent lawyer, NWP leader, and ERA drafter
  • Helen Stephens, Olympic gold medalist, propositioned by Hitler, Marine
  • Ida Tarbell, American investigative journalist
  • Ida Wells Barnett, founder of NAACP, journalist, civil rights, and woman suffrage
  • Jane Addams, American founder of Hull-House
  • Josephine Jewell Dodge, American anti-suffragist
  • Louise Stokes, Olympic athlete, barred from competing due to racism
  • Lucy Burns, American woman suffrage, founder of NWP
  • Madam C. J. Walker, American inventor and philanthropist
  • Mary Church Terrell, American civil rights leader, founder NACW and NAACP
  • Mileva Einstein, scientist, co-wrote Theory of Relativity
  • Molly Elliot Seawell, author and American anti-suffragist
  • Recy Taylor, civil rights activist and gang rape survivor
  • Rosa Parks, American civil rights activist
  • Ruby Pigford, Black rape survivor
  • Tidye Pickett, Olympic athlete, barred from competing due to racism
  • Fannie Lou Hammer, civil rights activist, victim of racist sterilization
 
World
  • Emmiline Pankhurst, British woman suffrage
  • Sarojini Naidu, Indian poet and political activist
  • Selma Lagerlof, first woman to win Nobel Prize for Literature

Mid 20th Century: Women’s Rights Advocates and Notable Women
United States
  • Alice Walker, author and Pulitzer Prize winner
  • Betty Friedan, American feminist
  • Eleanor Roosevelt, American activist, UN Ambassador from the US
  • Ethel L. Payne, First Lady of the Black Press
  • Jane Goodall, American primatologist
  • Margaret Chase Smith, American politician
  • Margaret Fuller, American writer
  • Margaret Mead, American anthropologist
  • Toni Morrison, first African American woman to win the Nobel Prize for Literature (1993)
  • Shirley Chisolm, first female presidential candidate
  • Ida Lovelace,
  • Hetty Lamar,
  • Grace Hopper,
  • Gertrude Perkins, Black rape survivor and civil rights activist
  • Kathleen Johnson,
  • Joanne Robinson, Black civil rights leader of Montgomery Bus Boycott
  • Claudette Colvin, early arrest in Montgomery Bus Boycott
 
World
  • Frida Kahlo, first Mexican artist featured at the Louvre, LGBTQ+
  • Golda Meir, Prime Minister of Israel during Yom Kippur War
  • Indira Gandhi, Prime Minister of India
  • Simone de Beauvoir, feminist theorist
 
Late 20th Century: Firsts, LGBTQ+, Feminism
United States
  • Angela Davis, American feminist and activist, LGBTQ+
  • Audre Lorde, American poet and writer, LGBTQ+
  • Barbara Jordan, African American woman from the south elected to Congress
  • Billie Jean King, 39-time Grand Slam winner, activist for women’s rights and LGBTQ+ rights
  • Cami Granato, first woman inducted into the Hockey Hall of Fame
  • Gloria Steinem, American feminist
  • Judith S. Murray, American feminist
  • Lena Waithe, first Black woman to win an Emmy for Outstanding Writing for a Comedy Series, LGBTQ+
  • Lori Lightfoot, first Black female and openly LGBTQ+ mayor
  • Margaret Thatcher, British prime minister
  • Sally Ride, first American woman in space, LGBTQ+
  • Shirley Chisolm, first female Representative to the House, first Black female presidential nominee
  • Tammy Baldwin, first openly LGBTQ+ senator in American history
 
World
  • Maria Corazon Aquino, President of Philippines
  • Wangari Maathai: environmentalist, educator
 
Modern Era
  • Hilary Clinton, first female presidential candidate for a major political party, First Lady, Senator, Secretary of State
  • Kamala Harris: vice presidential candidate, Senator
  • Michelle Obama, first African American First Lady
  • Nancy Pelosi, first female Speaker of the House
  • Katie Sowers, first openly LGBTQ+ and female Super Bowl coach
Fun Fact: This website is under construction.
Footnotes:
​Sarah offering Hagar to Abraham. copperplate engraving, 1804. Encyclopedia Britannica. https://www.britannica.com/biography/Sarah/images-videos#/media/1/523897/146455.
Museum, Trustees O. T. B. "Queen of the Night, Old Babylon." Ancient History Encyclopedia. Last modified April 26, 2012. https://www.ancient.eu/image/500/.
Empress Wu Zetian (r. 683-704 CE) of the Tang Dynasty. Image taken from An 18th-century album of portraits of 86 emperors of China, with Chinese historical notes. Originally published/produced in China, 18th century. (British Library, Shelfmark Or. 2231). https://www.ancient.eu/image/4558/empress-wu-zetian/. 
​Boudicca and her daughters, sculpture in London. Encyclopædia Britannica. https://www.britannica.com/biography/Boudicca/images-videos#/media/1/75413/129461.
Herbert Gustave Schmalz. Queen Zenobia's Last Look Upon Palmyra. 1888. Painting. https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Herbert_Schmalz-Zenobia.jpg.
Michelangelo. Cleopatra. circa 1533. https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:Cleopatra_in_art#/media/File:Michelangelo,_Cleopatra.jpg.
Elizabeth I, oil on panel attributed to George Gower, circa. 1588. Encyclopædia Britannica. https://www.britannica.com/biography/Elizabeth-I/images-videos#/media/1/184810/10392.​
​Pocahontas, painting based on Simon van de Passe's 1616 engraving. Encyclopædia Britannica. https://www.britannica.com/biography/Pocahontas-Powhatan-princess/images-videos#/media/1/465632/232359.
​Christophe Colomb a la cour d'Isabelle II / Pairs, Vve. Turgis ; Lith. de Turgis. , . [184-?] Photograph. https://www.loc.gov/item/94504672/.
Harris & Ewing, photographer. Portrait of Abigail Adams by Benjamin Blyth. , None. [Between 1910 and 1920] Photograph. https://www.loc.gov/item/2016854696/.
Sally Hemings. Oil on canvas. N.D. 3:AM Magazine. https://www.3ammagazine.com/3am/history-sex-race-sally-hemings-and-thomas-jefferson-once-and-twice-more/.
Mercy Otis Warren. Oil on canvas. N.D. ​Encyclopædia Britannica. https://www.britannica.com/biography/Mercy-Otis-Warren/images-videos#/media/1/636042/233338.
Sojourner Truth. N. D. Photograph. https://www.loc.gov/item/rbcmiller001306/.
​Angelina Emily Grimké. 1879. Photograph. https://www.loc.gov/item/2003653379/.
Lindsley, Harvey B, photographer. Portrait of Harriet Tubman. New York, None. [Auburn, n.y.: harvey lindsley, taken between 1871 and 1876?, printed between 1895 and 1910] Photograph. https://www.loc.gov/item/2018645051/.
Susan B. Anthony. Photomechanical print. 1897. Photograph. https://www.loc.gov/item/rbcmiller001314/.
Ida B. Wells, head-and-shoulders portrait, facing slightly right. , 1891. [Published] Photograph. https://www.loc.gov/item/93505758/.
Queen Victoria, c. 1890. Photograph. Encyclopedia Britanica. https://www.britannica.com/biography/Victoria-queen-of-United-Kingdom/images-videos#/media/1/627603/76076.
Mrs. Booker T. Washington, head-and-shoulders portrait facing right. , ca. 1917. Photograph. https://www.loc.gov/item/99401074/.
Bain News Service, Publisher. Margaret Sanger. 1916. published later by Bain. Photograph. https://www.loc.gov/item/2014700793/.
Woman fingerprinted.Mrs. Rosa Parks, Negro seamstress, whose refusal to move to the back of a bus touched off the bus boycott in Montgomery, Ala. , 1956. Photograph. https://www.loc.gov/item/94500293/.
Palumbo, Fred, photographer. Betty Friedan, half-length portrait, facing right / World Telegram & Sun photo by Fred Palumbo. , 1960. Photograph. https://www.loc.gov/item/96502198/.
​Leffler, Warren K, photographer. House Black Caucus Shirley Chisholm / / WKL. , 1973. [1/31/73 31 January] Photograph. https://www.loc.gov/item/2018650328/.
​Leffler, Warren K, photographer. Activist Phyllis Schafly wearing a "Stop ERA" badge, demonstrating with other women against the Equal Rights Amendment in front of the White House, Washington, D.C. Washington D.C, 1977. Feb. 4. Photograph. https://www.loc.gov/item/2011648744/.
Jenkins, R. Michael, photographer. Anita Hill testifying in front of the Senate Judiciary Committee during Clarence Thomas's Supreme Court confirmation hearing. Washington D.C, 1991. [11 Oct] Photograph. https://www.loc.gov/item/2019646369/.
​Keating, Maureen, photographer. First Lady Hillary Clinton, head-and-shoulders portrait, seated, facing left, during her presentation at a congressional hearing on health care reform. Washington D.C, 1993. [Sept] Photograph. https://www.loc.gov/item/2017650165/.
​Martin, Chris, Active Approximately, photographer. Seated at a table left to right Representative Eva Clayton, Senator Carol Moseley-Braun and Delegate Eleanor Holmes Norton, possibly at a Congressional Black Caucus meeting. Washington D.C, 1993. [Sept] Photograph. https://www.loc.gov/item/2015646958/.