Heroic efforts and milestone moments dot the landscape of women’s history. Often forced to fight for equality and inclusion, women have blazed trails and broken down barriers, all the while inspiring millions from their own era as well as future generations.
There’s been no shortage of notable events in women’s history. Some of those moments may have fallen off the radar of the general public, even if such events continue to affect the lives of women today. Recognition of notable moments in women’s history can provide significant insight into the individuals who made them possible.
Women’s rights convention
Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Lucretia Mott played pivotal roles in organizing the first women’s rights convention in 1848. The Seneca Falls Convention was held in New York on July 19 and 20, and abolitionist Frederick Douglass was among the noteworthy attendees. According to History.com, the work done at the Seneca Falls Convention, including the signing of the Declaration of Sentiments, sparked women’s rights advocacy and ultimately lead to suffrage for women, which was granted with the passage of the Nineteenth Amendment.
A woman earns a medical degree
Within months of the Seneca Falls Convention, England-born Elizabeth Blackwell graduates from the medical school at Geneva College in New York. Blackwell not only earns her medical degree, but also finishes with the highest marks in her graduating class. Blackwell’s trailblazing days did not end with the completion of her degree, as she ultimately became the first woman on the Medical Register of the General Medical Council for the United Kingdom.
“And ain’t I a woman?”
School children in the United States undoubtedly are familiar with the name Sojourner Truth, a noted abolitionist and former slave. In 1851, Truth, speaking at the Women’s Rights Convention in Akron, Ohio, asked, “And ain’t I a woman?” as she advocated for equal rights. The speech has been noted in popular culture over the last 170 years, but Truth’s now-famous query first gained considerable attention in 1863 during the American Civil War.
A woman sits on the bench of the Supreme Court
The Supreme Court of the United States was initially established by Congress through the Judiciary Act of 1789. Despite that lengthy history, no woman was sworn in as a Supreme Court Justice until 1981, when Sandra Day O’Connor was sworn in by then-U.S. President Ronald Reagan. Justice O’Connor, who passed away in late 2023 at the age of 93, served on the Supreme Court for roughly a quarter century, retiring in 2006.
These are just a handful of the many notable events in women’s history that have shed light on the bravery and invaluable contributions women have made through the years.
