Historical Women
Here is a small, but growing representation of short bios. Women have done many amazing things throughout history without recognition, being documented, or being rewarded. While we at Women in Exploration recognize that we will not be able to aptly represent all that has been contributed, we encourage people to submit the names and information about the women we do have written knowledge of. It is our goal to be a jumping off point for all that will ignite conversations about the countless things that women and girls have and will do to make our world a better place. Please suggest additional women to be added to our timeline or just read what we have so far. Thanks!
Gudrid Thorbjarnardóttir
Gudrid Thorbjarnardóttir was an Icelandic explorer and has been called the most traveled woman of the Middle Ages. Thorbjarnardóttir’s history is not completely clear since what is known comes from the Vinland Sagas. These two Icelandic texts; the Saga of the Greenlanders (Grænlendinga Saga) and the Saga of Eric the… Read more
Jeanne Baret
The French explorer and botanist Jeanne Baret is known as the first woman to circumnavigate the globe. She accompanied naturalist and botanist Philibert Commerson as part of the French government-sponsored worldwide expedition led by Louis Antoine de Bougainville between 1766 and 1769 before landing in Mauritius. On this trip, Baret… Read more
Caroline Herschel
German-born Caroline Herschel became one of the 18th century’s most influential female astronomers with her discovery of comets, nebulae, and other stellar and non-stellar findings. Although Herschel’s work had largely been accredited to her brother early in her career, scientific societies began recognizing Herschel’s work as her own after the… Read more
Hester Stanhope
Lady Hester Lucy Stanhope, also known as Queen Hester, was an explorer, traveler, aristocrat, archeologist, humanitarian and a pioneer of Western travel to remote areas of the Middle East. She conducted the first archaeological excavation in Palestine. She was one of the first people to use a textual source to… Read more
Mary Somerville
Mary Fairfax Somerville was a 19th century Scottish scientist and writer, renowned for her contributions to mathematics and physical science. Largely self-taught, she translated and wrote numerous scientific articles and popular textbooks on physics, astronomy, geography, and molecular science. A review of her first work led to the common usage… Read more
Ida Laura Pfeiffer
Ida Laura Pfeiffer was an Austrian explorer, travel writer, and ethnographer. She is also credited as the World’s First Solo Female Travel Writer. She traveled through Southeast Asia, the Americas, Middle East, and Africa, including two trips around the world from 1846 to 1855. She was a member of both… Read more
Mary Anning
Mary Anning’s paleontological finds contributed to the understanding Earth’s history. In 1811, at the age of 10, she made her first big discovery. As a fossil collector, dealer, and paleontologist she became known for her finds at Lyme Regis where she grew-up. Anning’s discoveries became key pieces of evidence for… Read more
Mary Seacole
Mary Jane Seacole was a British-Jamaican author, nurse, businesswoman, and healer. She was known as “Mother Seacole,” a heroine of the Crimean war for her efforts caring for sick and wounded soldiers. In July 1857, her autobiography, Wonderful Adventures of Mrs. Seacole in Many Lands, was the first autobiography written… Read more
Ada Lovelace
Augusta Lovelace was an English mathematician and writer. She is often regarded as the first person to realize the potential of computers. In 1843, she wrote, “The Analytical Engine weaves algebraic patterns just as the Jacquard loom weaves flowers and leaves. The machine is, in fact, the mechanical and material… Read more
Maria Mitchell
Maria Mitchell was an American astronomer, educator, writer, and naturalist. She is most notable for her discovery of comet 1847 VI, which was later named “Miss Mitchell’s Comet.” Mitchell was known internationally for her research and astronomical discoveries. She also served as a professor of astronomy at Vassar College for… Read more
Elizabeth Blackwell
Elizabeth Blackwell was a British physician who pioneered promoting education for women in medicine. She was the first woman to receive a medical degree in the U.S. and the first woman on the official register of medical practitioners in the United Kingdom. In 1849, she was the first woman in… Read more
Clara Barton
Clara Barton was an educator, nurse, patent clerk, author, and humanitarian. After years as a teacher, Barton became “Angel of the Battlefield” during the civil war, distributing supplies and nursing wounded soldiers. After the war, Barton ran the Office of Missing Soldiers and founded the American Red Cross. She was… Read more
Harriet Tubman
Harriet Tubman was an American abolitionist and political activist. She guided hundreds of enslaved people to freedom as a “conductor” of the Underground Railroad. Born into slavery, Tubman escaped to freedom in 1849. During the Civil War, Tubman worked as a spy for the Union Army. She served as a… Read more
Marianne North
Marianne North was a biologist, botanical illustrator and the only female artist in Britain to have a permanent exhibition at Kew Gardens. In a span of 20 years, North traveled throughout various parts of the world and painted rare plant specimens. As an accomplished explorer of flora, many plant species… Read more
Isabella Bird
Isabella Bird was a British 19th century explorer, writer, photographer, and naturalist. She was the first woman to be awarded an Honorary Fellowship of the Royal Scottish Geographical Society and the first female member of the Royal Geographical Society. She wrote numerous publications; was awarded the Royal Order of Kapiolani… Read more
Mary Edwards Walker
Mary Edwards Walker was an American physician, abolitionist, women’s rights activist, professor, author, prisoner of war, and Civil War surgeon. After serving on the front lines for the Union Army, Walker dedicated her life to fighting for women’s rights, and most notably, dress reform. She is the first and only… Read more
Alexandrine Tinné
Alexandrine Petronella Francina Tinné was a Dutch explorer and the first European woman to attempt to cross the Sahara Desert. Tinné led an expedition to the Bahr-el-Ghazal region of Sudan to explore and catalogue its flora and fauna. The Tinnean expedition led to the publication of the Plantae Tinnéennes in… Read more
Elizabeth Garrett Anderson
Elizabeth Garrett Anderson cofounded the London School of Medicine for Women, the first medical school in Britain to train female doctors. Anderson was the first woman to qualify in Britain as a physician and surgeon. She was active in the women’s suffrage movement and was the first female mayor in… Read more
Fanny Jane Butler
Fanny Jane Butler was in the first class of women at the London School of Medicine. She was one of the first female doctors to travel to India and spent seven years there opening medical dispensaries where no medical facilities had previously existed. Butler provided essential medical care for Indian… Read more
Annie Smith Peck
Annie Smith Peck was an American mountaineer, explorer, and author known as “America’s favorite woman climber.” In 1908, she was the first person to climb Peru’s Mount Huascarán. Peck was also a suffragist, a professor, and a public speaker.
Peck was born on October 19, 1850, in Providence, Rhode Island.… Read more
Eliza Ruhamah Scidmore
Eliza Ruhamah Scidmore was an explorer, geographer, journalist, travel writer, photographer, and advocate. She was the first female board member of the National Geographic Society and is well-known as the person responsible for planting Japanese cherry trees in Washington, D.C.
Eliza Ruhamah Scidmore was born on October 14, 1856, in… Read more
Harriet Hemenway
Harriet Lawrence Hemenway was one of the earliest wildlife advocates. She founded the Massachusetts Audubon Society (now known as Mass Audubon) which today protects more than 38,000 acres in Massachusetts. Mass Audubon organized fundraisers, organized conservation lectures and audited the women’s hat industry. By 1897, there were 111 local Audubon… Read more
Fanny Bullock Workman
Fanny Bullock Workman was one of the first female professional mountaineers. She was a geographer, cartographer, explorer, travel writer, and mountaineer who earned medals of honor from 10 European geographical societies. She was a member of the Royal Asiatic Society, Club Alpino Italiano, Deutscher und Österreichischer Alpenverein, Club Alpin Francais,… Read more
Mary Kingsley
Mary Henrietta Kingsley was an ethnographer, scientific writer, and explorer born in Cambridge, England. She is known for her travels throughout West Africa and the impact that her work had on European perceptions of African cultures and British imperialism. Kingsley authored “Travels in West Africa” and “West African Studies.” She… Read more
Florence Augusta Merriam Bailey
Florence Augusta Merriam Bailey was an ornithologist, animal rights’ activist and author. She is considered a pioneer in modern birdwatching: at a time when the most common practice for studying birds was to shoot or trap them, Merriam Bailey practiced and advocated for observational birdwatching.
She was born in 1863… Read more
Mary Edith Durham
Mary Edith Durham, also known as the “Queen of the Highlanders,” is one of the most prominent British anthropologists of the twentieth century. She left a significant contribution by studying the anthropology of the people of Southeast Europe, primarily Albanians. She is the author of several books on the Balkan… Read more
Nellie Bly
Elizabeth Cochran, best known by her writer’s pseudonym Nellie Bly, was an American journalist credited as one of the pioneers of investigative journalism. She reported mainly about women’s and social rights’ issues, although she is most known for her 72-day trip around the world.
Nellie Bly was born into an… Read more
Berthe Cabra
Berthe Cabra was a Belgian citizen who became the first woman to travel across Central Africa from east to west in 1905. Cabra and her husband, Commander Alphonse Cabra, were also the first Europeans to travel across Africa. When Cabra returned to Europe, she was hailed as a hero and… Read more
Aimée Crocker
Aimée Crocker, born Amy Isabella Crocker, was an American author, world traveler, Bohemian, and princess. She was dubbed “The Most Fascinating Woman of Her Age” by The Philadelphia Inquirer in the late 1930s. While she was known for her cultural exploration of the Far East, she was also known for… Read more
Katherine Routledge
Katherine Maria Routledge was an English archaeologist and anthropologist known for exploring Polynesia. In 1913-1914, she and her husband surveyed hundreds of prehistoric sites on Rapa Nui, also known as Easter Island. They excavated over thirty moai figures, and lived among the native people, recording their oral histories and legends.… Read more
Octavie Renard-Coudreau
Octavie Renard-Coudreau was a French explorer, mapmaker, and author known for her work in South America. She started by working with her husband, Henri Coudreau. After his untimely death she continued and led the expedition they started together and then led five expeditions herself in the Amazon region of the… Read more
Annette Meakin
Annette Mary Budgett Meakin was a British travel author. Meakin and her mother, Sarah, were the first English women to travel to Japan on the Trans-Siberian railway. The trip is significant because it marked the first time any woman traveled this journey, spanning from Western Europe to the easternmost tip… Read more
Marie Curie
Marie Curie, a Polish and naturalized-French citizen, was the first woman to win a Nobel Prize. She was a physicist, chemist, and innovator in the study of radiation. Her career began with the examination of uranium rays in 1896. Curie is the only person to receive the Nobel Prize in… Read more
Gertrude Bell
Gertrude Bell was a renowned writer, traveler, political officer, administrator, and archaeologist who became a highly influential policy maker for the British Empire due to her extensive knowledge of Syria-Palestine, Mesopotamia, Asia Minor, and Arabia throughout her travels. One of her greatest accomplishments was establishing and helping administer the modern… Read more
Sophia Hayden
Sophia Gregoria Hayden was the first woman to earn an architecture degree from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in 1886. She was the architect for the Woman’s Building at the 1893 World’s Columbian Exposition in Chicago.
Hayden was born in Santiago, Chile to a Peruvian mother and American father… Read more
Alexandra David-Néel
Alexandra David-Néel was a French writer, explorer, and Buddhist scholar. In 1924, at age 55, she was the first Western woman to enter the Tibetan city of Lhasa, when Tibet’s borders were closed to foreigners. She published more than 30 books about Eastern philosophy, religion, and her travels. Her teachings… Read more
Delia “Mickie” Akeley
Delia “Mickie” Akeley was an American explorer and author. In 1924, through the Brooklyn Museum of Arts and Sciences, Akeley organized and led two trips to Africa and lived in the Ituri Forest with Pygmies for several months. Akeley also accompanied her husband, Carl Akeley, on expeditions to Africa starting… Read more
Annie Cohen Kopchovsky
Annie Cohen Kopchovsky, known as Annie Londonderry, is recognized as the first woman to cycle around the world. On June 25, 1894, at the age of 24, she started from her home in Boston, Massachusetts and headed west. Once she reached Chicago she traveled back to New York and took… Read more
Ynés Mexia
In the span of 13 years, Ynés Mexia became the most accomplished female botanist and explorer of her time. She started her career in botany at age 55, and her legacy includes over 145,000 collected specimens. 500 of these were newly discovered species, and 50 of them have been named… Read more
Florence Rena Sabin
Florence Rena Sabin was an American pioneer in the medical field and the creator of the Sabin Health Laws reforming public health in Colorado. She was the first female full professor at Johns Hopkins School of Medicine and the first woman elected to the National Academy of Sciences. Sabin was… Read more
Harriet Chalmers Adams
Harriet Chalmers Adams was a leading American explorer, journalist, and geographer who traveled over 100,000 miles (160,000 km) in South America. Her expertise on Latin America was valued by private industry, the government as well as academia. She lectured for over twenty years with a National Geographic series and wrote… Read more
Isabelle Eberhardt
A Swiss-Russian explorer and author, Isabelle Wilhelmine Marie Eberhardt is acclaimed for her advocacy of decolonization and feminism at the turn of the 20th century. She spent the majority of her life exploring the North African Sahara and authoring fictional manuscripts set in her surroundings. Although she published her work… Read more
Rosalie Barrow Edge
Rosalie Barrow Edge is known for her work in nature conservation and legislation, as well as her early work in women’s suffrage. Edge advocated for species preservation and worked to expose ineffectiveness in the conservation establishment. She established Hawk Mountain Sanctuary in Pennsylvania, the world’s first preserve for birds of… Read more
Lizzy Lind af Hageby
Lizzy Lind af Hageby was a Swedish-British political activist and author. Throughout her life she gave lectures in opposition to child labor and prostitution; then in support of women’s emancipation; and later animal rights and animal protection and the link with feminism. Hageby co-founded the Animal Defence and Anti-Vivisection Society… Read more
Lise Meitner
Lise Meitner was an Austrian physicist who worked on radioactivity and nuclear physics. She was part of the team that discovered the element protactinium and nuclear fission, the latter achievement for which her colleague Otto Hahn was awarded the Nobel Prize. Meitner was recipient of numerous awards and honors. In… Read more
Hallie Morse Daggett
Hallie Morse Daggett was the first woman hired as a fire lookout by the United States Forest Service. A fire lookout’s job is to look for fire from a lookout tower. Fire lookout towers are typically in remote areas on high elevation allowing a clear view of the surrounding area… Read more
Marguerite Elton Harrison
Marguerite Elton Baker Harrison was an American journalist, spy, and film maker. In 1925, she co-founded the Society of Women Geographers. The society, still running today, brought women together who were interested in geography, world exploration, anthropology, and related fields.
Marguerite Elton Baker was born in October 1879 in Baltimore,… Read more
Blair Niles
Blair Niles was an American travel writer and novelist. She explored many countries and wrote about her expeditions. She was a founding member, and the first secretary of the Society of Woman Geographers. Niles was also the first woman to visit Devil’s Island penal colony in French Guiana.
Mary Blair… Read more
Charlotte Mansfield
Charlotte Mansfield was an English author, poet, and traveler who is most well known for her journeys through Africa in the early 1900s. Her trip, nicknamed “Cape to Cairo,” was a planned route starting in South Africa and ending in Cairo, Egypt. Mansfield hoped to be the first woman to… Read more
Emmy Noether
Emmy Noether was a German mathematician and considered one of the greatest mathematicians and scientists of all time. Her theorem, Noether’s theorem, changed classical and quantum physics and her research contributed extensively to the field of abstract algebra. In addition to mathematics, Noether is recognized today for her dedication and… Read more
Rachel Workman MacRobert
Rachel Workman MacRobert was an American geologist that grew up in Europe. She was the daughter of mountaineer Fanny Bullock Workman and was one of the first three female fellows of the Geological Society of London. MacRobert was elected as a life fellow of the Royal Society of Arts in… Read more
Augusta & Adeline Van Buren
Augusta Van Buren and Adeline Van Buren were the second and third women to drive motorcycles across the continental United States. The sisters rode 5,500 miles (8,800 km) in 60 days, each on their own motorcycle, starting on July 4, 1916, and completing on September 8, 1916.
Augusta and Adeline… Read more
Blanche Stuart Scott
Blanche Stuart Scott was an American aviator, screenwriter, and radio host. She was the first woman to drive across the United States in 1910 and the first female aviator to make a professional appearance in the United States. Scott was a test pilot, a consultant to the United States Air… Read more
Enid Gordon-Gallien
In 1928, the British explorer Enid Gordon-Gallien became the first person to map the previously uncharted Kalambo Falls in Zambia and Tanzania, one of the tallest interrupted waterfalls in Southern Africa. Her efforts alongside a team of surveyors and geologists would put Kalambo Falls at the forefront of archaeological expeditions.… Read more
Louise Arner Boyd
Louise Arner Boyd was the wealthy heir to a gold rush fortune that financed and led several expeditions to the Arctic. Her travels led to important scientific discoveries and technological innovations.
Arner Boyd was born in 1887 in San Rafael, California. Her family was wealthy, and she lived a very… Read more
Emma Rowena Gatewood
Emma Rowena Caldwell Gatewood, known as “Grandma Gatewood,” was an American extreme hiker. She was the first woman to hike the Appalachian Trail (AT) solo in one season. Gatewood accomplished this in 1955 at the age of 67; being the mother of 11, a grandmother, and a great-grandmother. She hiked… Read more
Marjory Stoneman Douglas
Suffragist, civil rights advocate, author, and journalist Marjory Stoneman Douglas served as a pivotal figure in the protection of the Florida Everglades. At the time there was little value seen in the subtropical marshlands. Douglas founded the Friends of the Everglades to combat overdevelopment and authored the book The Everglades:… Read more
Gertrude Emerson Sen
Gertrude Emerson Sen was an American writer and explorer. In 1925, she was a founding member of the Society of Woman Geographers, bringing together women interested in geography, world exploration, anthropology and related fields. Sen focused on Asia, starting in Japan, then becoming the editor of Asia magazine and then… Read more
Alice Ball
Alice Ball was a 19th-century African American chemist who before the age of 24, developed the most effective treatment at the time for leprosy or Hansen’s Disease. It was later known as the Ball Method; an injection used for 20 years. She was the first woman and the first African… Read more
Freya Stark
Freya Stark was a British explorer and travel writer. During her 100-year life, she traveled to repressed regions and wrote about her experiences. She was one of the first Westerners to visit the Elburz Mountains in Iran and from the experience she wrote The Valleys of the Assassins. Stark served… Read more
Osa Johnson
Osa Leighty Johnson was an American explorer and film maker. She collaborated on fourteen feature films, thirty-seven educational short films, eleven books, and many lectures with her husband Martin Johnson. Their expeditions to the South Pacific, Africa, and Borneo were captured over 27 years in photography and film. Their films,… Read more
Lady Grace Marguerite Hay Drummond-Hay
Lady Grace Marguerite Hay Drummond-Hay was a British journalist and a world traveler. She was the first woman to travel by air throughout the world in a zeppelin. In 1928, she was the only woman on the first transatlantic flight of the Graf Zeppelin from Germany to America. In 1929,… Read more
Gerty Theresa Cori
Gerty Theresa Cori was a biochemist who is most recognized for her work on the discovery of the Cori Cycle. The Cori Cycle explains the mechanism by which glycogen is broken down in muscle tissue into lactic acid and then resynthesized in the body and stored as a source of… Read more
Herma Albertson Baggley
Herma Albertson Baggley was a botanist, educator, and author who worked for the U.S. National Parks Service (NPS). Baggley was the first female Junior Park Naturalist in the NPS and worked on the NPS Mission 66 program that is credited with thousands of miles of new roads and new facilities,… Read more
Gertrude Blanch
Gertrude Blanch was a Polish born American mathematician who was the mathematical leader for the Mathematical Tables Project, a U.S. computing organization that tabulated higher mathematical functions before the invention of the digital electronic computer. Blanch was a pioneer in algorithm design for both human and mechanical computers. She was… Read more
Amelia Earhart
One of the most famous woman adventurers of all time, Amelia Earhart’s many feats include several world records, including being the first woman to fly solo across the Atlantic. Her tragic disappearance in 1937, which has never been resolved, cemented her legend.
Born in 1897 in Kansas, U.S.A., she is… Read more
Irène Joliot-Curie
Irène Joliot-Curie was a French radiochemist, activist, and politician who was the daughter of Marie and Pierre Curie. In 1935, Irène Joliot-Curie and her husband Frédéric were awarded the Nobel Prize in Chemistry for their discovery of artificial radioactivity, also known as induced radioactivity or man-made radioactivity. Their discovery assisted… Read more
Cecilia Payne-Gaposchkin
Cecilia Helena Payne-Gaposchkin was a British born American astrophysicist and astronomer. In 1925, she became the first person to earn a PhD in astronomy from Radcliffe College of Harvard University. Her doctoral thesis proposed that stars are composed primarily of hydrogen and helium, and that hydrogen was the overwhelming component… Read more
Clärenore Stinnes
Clärenore Stinnes was a German race car driver who in 1929, at age 28, became the first person to circumnavigate the globe by car. Prior to this success, she was an accomplished race car driver. By 1927, in her first two years of racing, she had won 17 titles.
Born… Read more
Margaret Mead
Margaret Mead was an American cultural anthropologist. Her field research, publications, and public works popularized the field as a whole and laid the groundwork for the sexual revolution of the 1960s. She advised government agencies, testified before Congress, lectured on a variety of subjects, published numerous books, and was a… Read more
Barbara McClintock
Barbara McClintock was an American scientist and winner of the 1983 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine, for the discovery of genetic transposition. A transposable element or jumping gene is a DNA sequence that can change its position within a genome. She was the first woman to win the prize… Read more
Mardy Murie
Mardy Murie is known as the “Grandmother of the Conservation Movement” for her career as a wilderness advocate and an early female leader in America’s conservation movement. Along with her husband and other conservationists, Murie was a key contributor to establishing the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge in Alaska. The Muries… Read more
Beryl Markham
The English-born Kenyan aviatrix, adventurer, horse trainer and author Beryl Markham accomplished many achievements throughout her life. She is best known for pushing the extremes of flying by being the first person to fly solo, non-stop across the Atlantic from Britain to North America; a feat which is still celebrated… Read more
Amy Johnson
Amy Johnson was an English pilot and the first woman to fly solo from England to Australia. She flew in World War II and was the first British-trained female ground engineer. Johnson also set many long-distant flying records including a solo record from London to Cape Town.
Johnson was born… Read more
Beryl Smeeton
Beryl Smeeton was a renowned explorer known for her travels in mountaineering, sailing, farming, and wildlife conservation throughout her long career. Among her many accomplishments, she journeyed around the Cape Horn and survived multiple accidents in the attempt and she founded the Cochrane Ecological Institute (CEI) which is dedicated to… Read more
Eva Dickson
Eva Dickson, who only lived for 33 years, was an explorer, war correspondent, travel writer, the first Swedish female rally driver, and the third Swedish female aviator. Dickson was the first woman to cross the Sahara Desert by car.
Dickson was born on March 8, 1905, in Sigtuna Sweden as… Read more
Gertrude Ederle
In 1926, Gertrude Ederle became the first woman to swim the English Channel at the age of 21. An Olympian and former world record-holder in five events, Ederle won three medals in the 1924 Olympics. Following her swim in the English Channel, Ederle accomplished many swimming records for short and… Read more
Kathleen Kenyon
British archaeologist, Kathleen Kenyon, is known for her excavations of ancient Jericho, one of the earliest continuous settlements in the world. She contributed to the archaeological research of Britain, Africa, and the Middle East. Kenyon was the first woman member of the Oxford Archaeological Society and the first female president.… Read more
Maria Goeppert Mayer
Maria Goeppert Mayer was the second woman to win a Nobel Prize in Physics. The German-born American theoretical physicist was a professor of physics at the University of California, San Diego, a Fellow of the American Physical Society, a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and received… Read more
Aloha Wanderwell
Aloha Wanderwell was a Canadian-American explorer, filmmaker, and lecturer. She is noted as the first woman to drive around the world from December 29, 1922, to January 1927. She started her career at age sixteen for a span of approximately thirty years. Her round-the-world journeys to over 80 countries and… Read more
Grace Brewster Murray Hopper
Over the course of her life, computer science pioneer, professor, and Navy Rear Admiral Grace Brewster Murray Hopper became one of the most accomplished programers of the twentieth century. Her contributions to the computer science field include developing one of the first link editors and promoting the idea of machine-independent… Read more
Rachel Carson
Rachel Carson was an American marine biologist, author, and conservationist. She is widely accredited with helping to create and advance the environmental movement.
Carson was born May 27, 1907, near Springdale, Pennsylvania. She was a keen reader, writer, and nature explorer from a young age, and had a fascination for… Read more
Ruth Patrick
Ruth Patrick was an American phycologist (algae scientist) and stream ecologist. She is regarded as one of the early pioneers of the science of limnology, the study of inland aquatic ecosystems. Her research focused on diatoms (single-cell algae) and freshwater ecology. During her career, she authored more than 200 scientific… Read more
Annemarie Schwarzenbach
Annemarie Schwarzenbach was a Swiss novelist, journalist, and photographer. She was responsible for 19 major works of writing during her lifetime, including coverage of the early events of World War II. Her work ranged from photographs of the rise of Fascism in Europe, to travelogues, to critiques of Swiss neutrality,… Read more
Rita Levi-Montalcini
Rita Levi-Montalcini was an Italian scientist, Nobel laureate, and a senator for life in the Italian Senate from 2001 until her death. Levi-Montalcini received many awards, such as the Golden Plate Award of the American Academy of Achievement, the Ralph W. Gerard Prize in Neuroscience, and the Nobel Prize for… Read more
Virginia Apgar
Virginia Apgar was a specialist physician, pioneer in the field of anesthesiology, obstetrics, and creator of the Apgar Score. Apgar created a system which helped lessen the infant mortality rate between the 1930s and 1950s. The Apgar Score rated infants in one minute after birth, and helped to determine their… Read more
Jean Batten
Jean Batten was a New Zealand aviator known for being the first person to fly solo from England to New Zealand in 1936. She broke several aviation records and was honored by many different countries and societies. Batten was the first female recipient of the Gold Air Medal of the… Read more
Annie Dodge Wauneka
A member of the Navajo Tribe of Arizona, Annie Dodge Wauneka is “the legendary mother of the Navajo nation.” She advocated for public health, education, and improved welfare for her tribe, and worked to fight epidemics throughout the nation. Wauneka was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 1963 by… Read more
Dorothy Hodgkin
Dorothy Mary Crowfoot Hodgkin was a British chemist and crystallographer. She was known for using x-ray techniques to determine the structure of biologically important molecules, including penicillin, insulin, and vitamin B12. Hodgkin won the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 1964, and her work was integral to the improvement of medicine… Read more
Chien-Shiung Wu
Chien-Shiung Wu was a Chinese-American experimental physicist. She was a part of the Manhattan Project during World War II and later became a professor at Columbia University. She is best known for conducting the Wu experiment where she proved that parity is not conserved during beta decay.
Chien-Shiung Wu was… Read more
Mary Douglas Leakey
Mary Douglas (Nicol) Leakey was a British archaeologist and paleoanthropologist. She discovered one genus, 15 new animal species, 25 early hominid remains, and numerous other fossils and tools during her career. Her two most notable findings were of a skull of an Australopithecus boisei (1.8 million years ago) and an… Read more
Nancy Bird-Walton
Nancy Bird-Walton was an Australian aviator. Her first flight was when she was 13 years old, by the time she was 17 she had her Class “A” license, and by 19 she had her commercial license. In 1924, she was the youngest Australian woman to get a pilot’s license. Bird-Walton… Read more
Honor Frost
Over the course of her career Honor Frost led the establishment of underwater archaeology as a productive field of research. Her many underwater expeditions in diverse locales such as Egypt, Turkey, and Italy altered understandings of ancient maritime history. Frost’s work pioneered the study of stone anchors left along the… Read more
Gertrude B. Elion
Gertrude B. Elion’s efforts over her career as a chemist have improved and saved the lives of countless individuals. Revolutionizing the development of drugs, she, along with her research collaborator, George Hitchings, developed the first anti-viral medication; the first immunosuppressant; and the first chemotherapy for childhood leukemia. In 1988, in… Read more
Katherine Johnson
Katherine Johnson was an American mathematician whose calculations were vital to the first United States spaceflights. In her 33 years at NASA, she helped develop the use of computers to perform complex calculations that she had previously done by hand. Johnson was one of the first African-American women to work… Read more
Beatrice Alice Hicks
Beatrice Hicks was an American engineer. In 1950, she founded and was the first president of the Society of Women Engineers. Hicks invented the Gas Density Sensor (patented in 1962), which the United States Space Program went on to use for several missions, including Apollo. Throughout her career, she earned… Read more
Celia Hunter
Celia Hunter was a pilot and adventurer turned conservationist who created and worked to pass an act that expanded the Alaskan national park system by over 43 million acres (174,000 km2) and created ten new national parks. Among her other wilderness preservation efforts, Hunter protected the northwestern Pacific coast from… Read more
Margaret Burbidge
Eleanor Margaret Burbidge was a British-American astrophysicist and observational astronomer. She was one of the founders of stellar nucleosynthesis, and was first author on the B2FH paper which described the origin of chemical elements. Burbidge also studied galaxy rotation curves, quasars, and she contributed research that supported the Big Bang… Read more
Jane Cooke Wright
A physician, scientist, professor, and researcher, Dr. Jane Cooke Wright, contributed significantly to chemotherapy, revolutionizing cancer research and creating treatment accessibility for doctors and patients. In addition to pioneering oncological research, Dr. Wright authored 135 scientific papers and served nationally and internationally to treat cancer patients, instruct doctors, and develop… Read more
Dorothy May Pine
Dorothy May Pine and her husband, Robert, became the first couple in the world to visit all of the world’s 192 recognized countries and 123 territories, island groups and special destinations as defined by the Travelers Century Club (TCC). Known as the “world’s most travelled couple,” Pine was the first… Read more
Rosalind Franklin
Rosalind Elsie Franklin was an English chemist and X-ray crystallographer, a scientist that determines the atomic and molecular structure of crystal. Her work was fundamental to the understanding of the molecular structures of DNA (deoxyribonucleic acid), RNA (ribonucleic acid), viruses, coal, and graphite. Her impacts on the discovery of the… Read more
Marie Tharp
Marie Tharp was an American oceanographic cartographer and geologist. In collaboration with Bruce Heezen, she developed the first map of the Atlantic Ocean floor. Tharp’s work defined the complex geographical landscape and topography of the ocean floor. She also detailed the existence of a continued rift valley along the Mid-Atlantic… Read more
Loretta Ford
Loretta Ford is an American educator and nurse. She cofounded the first nurse practitioner program, providing increased healthcare in rural and urban areas. In 1999, Ford was named a Living Legend of the American Academy of Nursing. Ford was the founding dean of the nursing school at the University of… Read more
Rosalyn Sussman Yalow
Rosalyn Sussman Yalow was an American medical physicist and made contributions to the fields of physics and biological research. In 1977, she was the co-winner of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for her role in the development of the radioimmunoassay. She was the second woman, and first American-born… Read more
Eugenie Clark
From her graduation in 1942 to her last dive in 2014, Eugenie Clark conducted over 70 submersible dives and became known as “The Shark Lady.” In a career that spanned 60 years, Clark devoted her life to conservation of marine life focusing on sharks and their behavior and intelligence. She… Read more
Margaret S. Collins
Margaret S. Collins was the first African American female entomologist in the United States. She was a child prodigy, professor, and activist. Nicknamed the “Termite Lady” due to her research on termites, she specialized in the insects of Guyana and Florida. In 1989, Collins discovered a new species of termite,… Read more
Bethine Clark Church
Born and raised alongside the Salmon River in Idaho, Bethine Clark Church emerged from humble beginnings to become a Democratic icon and lifelong supporter of the causes most important to her: the Environment, Education, Health care and Human Rights. A strong family background in politics and public service were the… Read more
Stephanie Kwolek
Stephanie Kwolek was an American chemist and inventor of Kevlar. Kevlar is used in more than 200 products, including spacecraft and bulletproof vests. Kwolek had a 40-year career at DuPont and filed over a dozen patents. Her contributions to scientific innovation led to increased safety and protection for thousands of… Read more
Janet Davison Rowley
Janet Davison Rowley was an American human geneticist and the first scientist to identify a chromosomal translocation as the cause of leukemia and other cancers, which proved that cancer is a genetic disease. Rowley spent the majority of her life working in Chicago and received many awards and honors recognizing… Read more
Nancy Roman
Nancy Grace Roman is an American astronomer and called the “Mother of Hubble.” Roman was both the first Chief of Astronomy in the Office of Space Science at NASA Headquarters, and the first woman to hold an executive position at NASA. Roman was a spokesperson and advocate of women in… Read more
Vera Florence Cooper Rubin
An astronomer, Vera Rubin explored the galaxies beyond planet Earth. Fueled by love for science and the stars, she is remembered today as a role model, mentor, and boundary breaker in science and astronomy. Credited for her discoveries of dark matter and her theories for rotational curves, Rubin is one… Read more
Mildred Dresselhaus
Mildred Dresselhaus, was an American nanotechnologist, solid-state physicist, and professor known as the “Queen of Carbon Science.” She is a world leader in nanotechnology, holding a 57-year career as a Professor at MIT in the departments of physics and electrical engineering. Her science and engineering research earned her presidential and… Read more
Tu Youyou
Tu Youyou is a pharmaceutical chemist and malariologist, born and educated in China. Referred to as the “Three-Without Scientist”, Tu discovered tropical medicines used to treat schistosomiasis and malaria without a doctoral degree, work or research experience abroad, or affiliations with national academies. In 2015, in honor of her work… Read more
Dervla Murphy
Dervla Murphy is an Irish touring cyclist and travel writer. Her first book, Full Tilt: Dunkirk to Delhi by Bicycle, followed her 1963 seven-month solo cycling journey from Ireland to India. Murphy has published 26 books. She was awarded the Royal Geographical Society’s Ness Award “for the popularisation of geography… Read more
Dian Fossey
Dian Fossey was an American primatologist and conservationist, known for her studies on mountain gorillas in the forests of Rwanda. Her work contributed to the improved understanding of mountain gorillas and the strengthening of their declining numbers.
Fossey was born January 16, 1932, in San Francisco, California. She was an… Read more
Annie Easley
Annie Easley was as an American computer scientist, mathematician, and rocket scientist at the Lewis Research Station (known today as NASA Glenn Research Center). Easley began her career in 1955 and was one of the first African-Americans to work as a computer scientist at NASA. During her 34-year career she… Read more
Elinor Ostrom
In 2009, Elinor Ostrom became the first woman to receive the Nobel Prize in Economic Sciences for her work as a political economist. Her analysis of economic governance, namely the commons, explores the capability of individuals to manage common-pool resources rather than relying on regulations by central authorities or privatization.… Read more
Jane Goodall
Dr. Jane Goodall is an English primatologist and anthropologist. Her long-term study of wild chimpanzees in Tanzania is the world’s longest running continuous wildlife research project and has changed what the world knows about chimpanzees. Her discoveries and conservation efforts have been recognized through her many honors and she has… Read more
Daphne Sheldrick
Daphne Sheldrick dedicated her career to the protection and conservation of African wildlife. From 1955-1976 she was co-warden of the Tsavo National Park, where she developed the first successful milk replacement formula for orphaned baby elephants. The formula developed by Sheldrick used coconut oil as a substitute for the fat… Read more
Sylvia Earle
Dr. Sylvia Earle is President and Chairman of Mission Blue and the Sylvia Earle Alliance. She was the first female chief scientist of the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and a National Geographic Explorer in Residence. Dr. Earle is a world-renowned oceanographer, explorer, author, and lecturer who has spent… Read more
Anne LaBastille
Over the course of her life, ecologist, award-winning author, and photographer Anne LaBastille became one of the most influential guides and environmental activists of the twentieth century in the Adirondack Mountain region. LaBastille was honored by the Explorers Club, the Society of Woman Geographers, and the World Wildlife Fund for… Read more
Krystyna Chojnowska-Liskiewicz
Krystyna Chojnowska-Liskiewicz is a Polish sailor and in 1978 became the first woman to sail around the world solo. Prior to the start of the trip, Chojnowska-Liskiewicz was an experienced sailor as well as a trained ship construction engineer. Her yacht was designed specially for her needs. She launched in… Read more
Junko Tabei
Junko Tabei is a Japanese mountaineer, author, and teacher. In 1975, she was the first woman to reach the summit of the world’s highest peak, Mount Everest. In 1992, she was the first woman to climb the Seven Summits, the highest peak on each continent – Kilimanjaro (1980), Mt. Aconcagua… Read more
Wangari Maathai
Awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 2004, Wangari Maathai spent her life fighting for and promoting democracy and peace, sustainable development, and the empowerment of women. In her lifetime, Dr. Wangari Maathai authored four books and numerous scientific publications. She is the recipient of 15 honorary degrees in science, law,… Read more
Wanda Rutkiewicz
Wanda Rutkiewicz was an electrical engineer, climber, author, documentary film maker, and advocate for women climbers. Rutkiewicz was the third woman to reach the summit of Mount Everest, and the first Pole. Eight years later she became the first woman to climb the world’s second-highest peak, K2, doing so without… Read more
Mollie Beattie
Mollie Beattie was a conservationist and the first female director of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Services. During her career, she established many new conservation plans and oversaw the establishment of new wildlife reserves. She was also involved in conservation legislation, and was a champion of the Endangered Species Act.… Read more
Sally Ride
Sally Ride was an American astronaut and physicist. In 1983, she became the first American woman and the third woman in history to go into space. Ride was also the youngest American astronaut to travel to space, venturing to deploy two communications satellites at the age of 32. During her… Read more
Judith Young
Judith Young was an American physicist, astronomer, and educator. She focused on galaxy formation and evolution, star formation, and interstellar matter. During her 15-year career, Young published over 130 papers. In 1986, she was the first person to be awarded the Maria Goeppert-Mayer Award from the American Physical Society, “For… Read more