18 Apr | Women.Words.Work

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Mary [Katherine] Baptist Russell (18 Apr 1829 – 06 Aug 1898 | Bewry IE – San Francsico CA) educator, Sister of Mercy, religious activist, founded home for infirm.

Marion Foster Welch (18 Apr 1851 – 09 Jul 1935 | Pittsburgh PA – Pittsburgh PA) pianist, composer, lecturer, piano teacher, curator of Stephen Foster Memorial.

Clara Elsene Peck Williams (18 Apr 1883 – 24 Feb 1968 | Allegan MI – Gettysburg PA) painter, etcher, illustrator, comics artist, watercolorist.

Edna Hall Scott Kump (18 Apr 1887 – 19 Jan 1957 | Elkins WV – Elkins WV) gardener, First Lady of West Virginia.

Lucile McVey Drew (18 Apr 1890 – 03 Nov 1925 | Sedalia MO – Los Angeles CA) actress, knitter, comedian, director, producer, screenwriter, aka Jane Morrow, Mrs. Sidney Drew.

24 Mar | Women.Words.Work

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Margaret A. E. Parkinson McLure (24 Mar 1811 – 31 Jan 1902 | Parkersburg WV – St Louis MO) aka Mother McLure, American Civil War Confederate sympathizer, founded Missouri Confederate Home, co-founded Daughters of the Confederacy.

Frances Jane [Fanny] Crosby van Alstyne (24 Mar 1820 – 12 Feb 1915 | Brewster NY – Bridgeport CT) poet, lyricist, composer, blind activist, mission worker, autobiographical author.

Matilda Electa Joslyn Gage (24 Mar 1826 – 18 Mar 1898 | Cicero NY – Chicago IL) artist, editor, author, suffragist, Theosophist, freethinker, Native American activist.

Candace Thurber Wheeler (24 Mar 1827 – 05 Aug 1923 | Delhi NY – New York NY) textile / interior designer, women’s arts supporter, aka Mother of Interior Design.

Bertha Hedges Spafford Vester (24 Mar 1878 – 27 Jun 1968 | Chicago IL – Jerusalem ISR) social service activist for girls / women, leader / member of The American Colony in Jerusalem [founded by her parents].

20 Jan | Women.Words.Work

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Harriet Eaton Stanton Blatch (20 Jan 1856 – 20 Nov 1940 | Seneca Fall NY – Greenwich CT) writer, speaker, suffragist.

Julia Morgan (20 Jan 1872 – 02 Feb 1957 | San Francisco CA – San Francisco CA) architect, Arts and Crafts Movement supporter, first female AIA Gold Medalist [posthumous award].

Zelda Paldi Sears (20 Jan 1873 – 19 Feb 1935 | Brockway Township MI – Hollywood CA) novelist, actress, lyricist, playwright, screenwriter, businesswoman.

Drusilla Dunjee Houston (20 Jan 1876 – 08 Feb 1941 | Harpers Ferry WV – Phoenix AZ) author, musician, educator, journalist, columnist, screenwriter, independent historian, co-founded Oklahoma City chapters of YWCA / Red Cross / NAACP, one of first leaders of Oklahoma Federation of Colored Women’s Clubs, contributing editor to Oklahoma Black Dispatch [first black newspaper in Oklahoma City, founded by brother Roscoe Dunjee].

Irma LeVasseur (20 Jan 1877 – 18 Jan 1964 | Quebec City QC – Quebec City QC) physician, pioneering pediatrician, first French-Canadian female doctor.

15 Jan | Women.Words.Work

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Abigail [Abby] Kelley Foster (15 Jan 1811 – 14 Jan 1887 | Pelham MA – Worcester MA) suffragist, speaker, abolitionist, women’s rights activist, radical social reformer.

Constance Faunt Le Roy Runcie (15 Jan 1836 – 17 May 1911 | Indianapolis IN – Winnetka MO) poet, artist, author, pianist, composer, short story writer.

Katharine Bement Davis (15 Jan 1860 – 10 Dec 1935 | Buffalo NY – Pacific Grove CA) author, criminologist, progressive era social reformer, first female NYC Correction Commissioner, science-based prison reformer, groundbreaking female sexuality researcher, first US female PhD in economics and political science.

Loïe Fuller (15 Jan 1862 – 01 Jan 1928 | Fullersburg IL – Paris FR) dancer, memoirist, choreographer, free dance practitioner, stage lighting artist / inventor / patent holder.

Frances Benjamin Johnston (15 Jan 1864 – 16 May 1952 | Grafton WV – New Orleans LA) pioneering photographer, early female photojournalist.

14 Dec | Women.Words.Work

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Mary Tappan Wright (14 Dec 1851 – 25 Aug 1916 | Steubenville OH – Cambridge MA) novelist, short story writer.

Lavinia Norman (14 Dec 1882 – 22 Jan 1983 | Montgomery WV – Washington DC) lifelong educator, French / English / Latin teacher, original founding member of Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority / first sorority founded by African-American women at Howard University.

Helen Steketee (14 Dec 1882 – 23 Aug 1974 | Grand Rapids MI – Grand Rapids MI) artist, still-life / landscape painter.

Jane Bailey Cowl (14 Dec 1883 – 22 Jun 1950 | Boston MA – Santa Monica CA) playwright, stage / film actress, WWII co-director of NYC Stage Door Canteen, wrote in collaboration with Jane Murfin, often used joint pseudonym Allan Langdon Martin.

Ethel Browne Harvey (14 Dec 1885 – 02 Sep 1965 | Baltimore MD – Falmouth MA) author, zoologist, embryologist, women’s educational rights activist / advocate.

23 Aug | Women.Words.Work

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Mary Moody Emerson (23 Aug 1774 – 01 May 1863 | Concord MA – Concord MA) poet, author, literary family member, mentor to her nephew Ralph Waldo Emerson.

Lillie Hitchcock Coit (23 Aug 1843 – 22 Jul 1929 | Mobile AL – San Francisco CA) folk figure, aka Firebell Lil, philanthropist, cookbook author, Coit Tower benefactor, San Francisco Volunteer Firefighters patroness, born Elizabeth Wyche Hitchcock.

Sarah Frances Whiting (23 Aug 1847 – 12 Sep 1927 | Wyoming NY – Wilbraham MA) author, essayist, physicist, astronomer, first professor of physics at Wellesley College, funded Whiting Observatory at Wellesley.

Amelie Louise Rives Troubetzkoy (23 Aug 1863 – 15 Jun 1945 | Richmond VA – Cismont VA) poet, novelist, playwright.

Edith Lake Wilkinson (23 Aug 1868 – 19 Jul 1957 | Wheeling WV – Huntington WV) lesbian, studied at Arts Student League of New York, degree from Columbia Teacher’s College [1905], Provincetown MA artist / printmaker, committed to mental hospitals [from 1924 till her death] [Note: middle image from HBO documentary © 2022 Greenie Films and Little Mama, Inc.].

21 Jul | Women.Words.Work

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Mary Anna Morrison Jackson (21 Jul 1831 – 24 Mar 1915 | Lincoln NC – Charlotte NC) author, memoirist, military / political wife, aka Widow of the Confederacy.

Henrietta Maria Morse Chamberlain King (21 Jul 1832 – 31 Mar 1925 | Boonville MO – Kingsville TX) Texas rancher, philanthropist, public school builder.

Mary Foote Henderson (21 Jul 1842 – 16 Jul 1931 | Seneca Falls NY – Bar Harbor ME) author, suffragist, art collector, social activist, community developer, temperance leader.

Myra Horner Camden Atkinson (21 Jul 1844 – 13 Apr 1925 | Lumberport WV – Clarksburg WV) First Lady of Virginia, genealogist / family historian.

Blanche Willis Howard von Teuffel (21 Jul 1847 – 07 Oct 1898 | Bangor ME – Munich DEU) pianist, novelist.

27 Jun | Women.Words.Work

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Hannah Mather Crocker (27 Jun 1752 – 11 Jul 1829 | Roxbury MA – Boston MA) essayist, educator, school founder, women’s rights activist, advocate for women Freemasons, Revolutionary War spy, authored first American book on rights of women.

Maria Monk (27 Jun 1816 – 08 Sep 1849 | Saint-Jean-sur-Richelieu QC – Roosevelt Island NY) author, memoirist, religious sister, controversial Canadian folk figure, alleged infanticide / systemic sexual abuse in Catholic convent.

Ednah Dow Littlehale Cheney (27 Jun 1824 – 19 Nov 1904 | Boston MA – Jamaica Plain MA) writer, editor, reformer, philanthropist, secretary of School of Design for Women.

Eugenia Scholay Washington (27 Jun 1838 – 30 Nov 1900 | Charles Town WV – Washington DC) historian, civil servant, co-founded Daughters of American Revolution / Daughters of Founders and Patriots of America.

Harriet Hubbard Ayer (27 Jun 1849 – 23 Nov 1903 | Chicago IL – New York NY) socialite, journalist, essayist, kidnap victim, proto-feminist, founded first successful US female-owned cosmetics company, editor of New York World newspaper women’s pages, highest paid US female journalist at the time of her death.

11 Jun | Women.Words.Work

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Anne Newport Royall (11 Jun 1769 – 01 Oct 1854 | Baltimore MD – Washington DC) writer, publisher, reformer, journalist, possibly first professional female journalist in America.

Caroline Le Gresley LeSueur (11 Jun 1814 – 01 Oct 1898 | Jersey, Channel Islands – St Johns AZ) Mormon, farmer, pioneer, settler, co-founder of St. Johns, Arizona.

Lucy Petway Holcombe Pickens (11 Jun 1832 – 08 Aug 1899 | La Grange TN – Edgefield SC) author, socialite, flag seamstress, Confederate icon, aka Queen of the Confederacy.

Mary Leslie (11 Jun 1842 – 01 Mar 1920 | UK – Toronto ON) artist, art teacher, columnist for McLure Syndicate, conducted Leslie’s College for Women, pen names: J.T.J., James Thomas Jones.

Olivia America Davidson Washington (11 Jun 1854 – 09 May 1889 | Mercer WV – Boston MA) teacher, Tuskegee Institute co-founder.

26 May | Women.Words.Work

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Ann Hall (26 May 1792 – 11 Dec 1863 | Pomfret CT – New York NY) miniature portrait painter.

Mary Andrews Denison (26 May 1826 – 15 Oct 1911 | Cambridge MA – Cambridge MA) editor, novelist, playwright, aka Clara Vance, Civil War nurse, short story writer.

Clara Louise Root Burnham (26 May 1854 – 20 Jun 1927 | Newton MA – Bailey Island ME) author, hymnist.

Edna Brady Cornwell (26 May 1868 – 01 Dec 1958 | Romney WV – Romney WV) newspaper publisher, West Virginia State First Lady.

Peggy Hopkins Joyce (26 May 1893 – 12 Jun 1957 | Berkley VA – New York NY) dancer, actress, folk figure, artist model, autobiographical author.