Parentella

March is also Women’s History Month

March is Women’s History Month, and March 8 is the 100^th anniversary of International Women’s Day. Where did they originate from?

• March 8, 1857 — women textile workers in New York went on strike to protest against low wages and poor working conditions.
• Fifty years later, the strike was commemorated when women demanded a 10-hour work day
• In subsequent years, on March 8, women demonstrated for the right to vote and an end to child labor.
• An International Women’s Day was proposed in 1910 at the International Conference of Working Women in Copenhagen, and in 1911 the first celebration was officially held.

Now millions of women all across the world celebrate the event! In honor of Women’s History Month and International Women’s Day, we’d like share a few fun facts about women throughout history:

The earliest recorded female physician was Merit Ptah, a doctor in ancient Egypt around 2700 B.C. She may be the first woman recorded by name in the history of all of the sciences.

In Ancient Egypt, one of the most successful dynasties was that of Hatshepsut, a female Pharaoh. She ruled from about 1479 to 1458 BC. (The picture above is me at the temple devoted to her–remember, all Pharaohs were believed to be deities and thus all had a temple.)

The world’s first novel, The Tale of Genji,was published in Japan around A.D. 1000 by female author Murasaki Shikibu

British Queen Victoria ruled from 1837 – 1901, over one of the largest empires in the history of the world–at one point controlling land on nearly every continent.

The first country to grant women the right to vote in the modern era was New Zealand in 1893. The same year, Elizabeth Yates also become Mayor of Onehunga, NZ–the first ever female mayor anywhere in the British empire.

Marie Curie is the only woman to ever win two Nobel Prizes, one for physics for spontaneous radiation (1903) and the other in chemistry for radioactivity (1911).

Jeannette Rankin, a Republican from Montana, was the first woman elected to serve in Congress. She was elected in both 1916 and 1940. A lifelong pacifist, she was the only member of Congress to vote against entering World War II.

The first female governor of a U.S. state was Nellie Tayloe Ross in Wyoming, elected in 1924. Wyoming was also the first state to give women the right to vote, in 1869.

Jane Addams was the first woman to be awarded the Nobel Peace Prize (1931) for founding Hull House, an organization that improved quality of life for people by improving education and living conditions.

The first female member of a president’s cabinet was Frances Perkins, Secretary of Labor under FDR. She remained in office for the duration of FDRs terms (1933 – 1945) and helped put together the labor programs needed for the New Deal to succeed.

The first woman to rule a country as an elected leader in the modern era was Sirimavo Bandaranaike of Sri Lanka, who was elected Prime Minister in 1960 and later re-elected in 1970.

References: http://www.mastersdegree.net/blog/2011/50-fascinating-facts-for-womens-history-month/, http://www.ufcw.org/womens_history_month/international_womens_day/index.cfm. Image credit: http://kosmos.liveflux.net/blog/2008/07/04/luxor-temples-and-faluccas/.

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Written by Christi Grab, Parentella’s Editorial Director and author of  The Unexpected Circumnavigation: Unusual Boat, Unusual People Part 1 – San Diego to Australia.

Related posts:

1. International Women’s Day
2. Black History Highlights: 1619 – 1839
3. Black History Highlights: 1856 – 1861
4. Back to the Roots of Labor Day’s Significance
5. Senate Passes Bill to Fund Education Jobs

Tags: facts about women, International Women's Day, Women's history Month

This entry was posted on Tuesday, March 8th, 2011 at 12:15 am and is filed under Christi Grab, Miscellaneous. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.