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Women's History

The researchers connected an inscription on a marble pedestal to the well-preserved marble sculpture.

Cool Finds

Archaeologists Say They’ve Solved the Mystery of This Marble Statue. Its Subject Was a Woman Who Might Have Helped an Ancient City Achieve Political Freedom

The marble sculpture, discovered at Chersonesos Taurica in Crimea in 2003, has been identified as a woman named Laodice

Medical supplies for the front are piled up at a railway station in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, in 1935. Back in America, Black educator Melva L. Price rallied support for Ethiopian refugees fleeing the violence of the Second Italo-Ethiopian War.

During the Great Depression, This Black Educator Looked to Conflicts Abroad for Lessons on Fighting Racism at Home

The Second Italo-Ethiopian War and the Spanish Civil War offered Melva L. Price and her fellow female activists an opportunity to examine the links between racism and fascism

A depiction of George Washington and his mother, Mary Ball Washington, attending a ball celebrating the surrender at Yorktown in 1781

America's 250th Anniversary

The Reinvention of George Washington’s Mother, From Paragon of Virtue to Greedy Shrew to Widow Striving for Independence

A new biography examines how 19th-century Americans remembered Mary Ball Washington, who raised the future president largely on her own after her husband’s death in 1743

Visitors participate in a Forest Temple service in the spiritualist community of Lily Dale, about an hour southwest of Buffalo.

The Tiny New York Town Where Mediums Give Voice to the Dead

Lily Dale is home to about 40 mediums who connect thousands of spiritual seekers with their deceased loved ones

Clockwise from top left: Abigail Adams, Harriet Jacobs, Zora Neale Hurston and Eleanor Roosevelt.

Four Famous American Women Who Were Also Prolific Letter Writers

In a long and storied tradition, these bold women recorded history—and shaped it—through their correspondence

Jesse Mockrin. The Descent, oil on linen, 7.5 by 25.8 feet, 2024.

A New Exhibit in Toronto Reexamines the Works of the Baroque Masters

In her monumental work inspired by the Rape of the Sabine Women, an artist reimagines a much-depicted story from antiquity

Left to right, American models Joanna McCormick, Janet Randy, Betsy Pickering and Gretchen Harris pose for Charm amid traffic on Park Avenue. 

The First Magazines Written for Career Women Reveal a Portrait of Immense Creativity and Hope

Publications including “Mademoiselle,” “Glamour” and the long-forgotten “Charm” first emerged in the 1930s to satisfy an emergent force in the workplace

“We cannot be indifferent on any occasion that appears nearly to affect the peace and happiness of our country,” wrote the resolution’s 51 signees. Their words were republished in newspapers across the Thirteen Colonies and beyond.

America's 250th Anniversary

To Protest British Taxes, Men Dumped Tea Into Boston Harbor. With the Edenton Tea Party, Colonial Women Took a Different Approach

In 1774, 51 North Carolinian women led by Penelope Barker signed a resolution supporting the boycott of British goods

Thornton's handwritten memoirs recount the same period of her life.

Read the Dramatic 17th-Century Memoirs of Alice Thornton, Who Wrote Four Versions of Her Life Story

Researchers have digitized all four volumes, which are now available online. The autobiographies offer a compelling window into a tumultuous period in English history

Umpire Jen Pawol during a spring training game between the Philadelphia Phillies and the Miami Marlins on March 16, 2024

Women Who Shaped History

Jen Pawol Is About to Become the First Female Umpire in Major League Baseball History

When the Atlanta Braves face off against the Miami Marlins this weekend, Pawol will become the first woman to umpire in a regular season MLB game

The hyper-realistic busts are on display at the Moravian Museum in Brno, Czech Republic.

New Research

See the Faces of Two Sisters Who Toiled Away in a Neolithic Mine 6,000 Years Ago

Archaeologists created 3D reconstructions of the women’s faces based on an analysis of their teeth and bones. Found in the Czech Republic, the siblings “did not have an easy life,” the new research suggests

Amelia Earhart stands in front of her Lockheed Vega flanked by two men in 1932

Amelia Earhart Made History in a Plane She Called Her ‘Little Red Bus.’ Here’s How It Became a Revered Museum Artifact and Hallowed Symbol

As the Smithsonian presents the aviator’s restored Vega in Washington, a special replica of the aircraft quietly re-emerges after decades in obscurity

Artist Franck Duval, known as FKDL, works on a mural Josephine Baker in Paris.

Women Who Shaped History

A Vibrant Mural Celebrating Josephine Baker’s ‘Two Loves’—‘My Country and Paris’—Has Been Unveiled in France

The colorful street art, which features a quote from one of her songs, honors the iconic singer, dancer and civil rights activist’s enduring legacy

An 1880 Harper's Weekly illustration titled Women at the Polls in New Jersey in the Good Old Times

America's 250th Anniversary

How Women in New Jersey Gained—and Lost—the Right to Vote More Than a Century Before the 19th Amendment Granted Suffrage Nationwide

Vague phrasing in the state’s Revolutionary-era Constitution enfranchised women who met specific property requirements. A 1790 law explicitly allowed female suffrage, but this privilege was revoked in 1807

The new study analyzed 131 skeletons dated to between 7100 and 5950 B.C.E.

Ancient DNA Reveals That Men Moved in With Their Brides’ Families in This Neolithic Settlement

A new study suggests that a 9,000-year-old society in Catalhoyuk, a proto-city in southern Anatolia, may have established a “female-centered” social structure

Foster + Partners, the firm selected to design the memorial, plans to build a bridge with a reinforced glass balustrade inspired by the tiara the queen wore on her wedding day.

A New Memorial Will Honor Elizabeth II With a Bridge Inspired by Her Diamond-Studded Wedding Tiara

A British architecture firm has been selected to design the queen’s memorial in London, which will include a translucent bridge that evokes her wedding tiara’s delicate silhouette

An engraving by Edward Savage, after Robert Edge Pine's 1784-1788 painting Congress Voting Independence

America's 250th Anniversary

These Daring Revolutionary-Era Artists Promoted the Patriot Cause From the Heart of Enemy Territory

A new book explores how painters, sculptors and writers, especially women and people of color, used their craft to advocate for American independence while living in George III’s capital city

Tove Jansson with Moomin dolls

A Bold Finnish Artist Brought These Precious Little Hippopotamus-Like Trolls to the World 80 Years Ago

Tove Jansson was a trailblazing illustrator and author—and the inventor of the beloved Moomins, the central characters of her whimsical children’s books

Pages from Eve Adams' Polish passport

LGBTQ+ Pride

America Deported Her for Publishing a Book Titled ‘Lesbian Love.’ Years Later, She Was Murdered by the Nazis for Being Jewish

Eve Adams, an immigrant and the proprietor of a 1920s lesbian tearoom, was imprisoned for disorderly conduct and obscenity, then sent back to Europe, where she became a target of the Holocaust

Wade in the Water, Stephen Towns, 2020

Women Who Shaped History

See the Artworks That Explore the Forgotten History of Harriet Tubman’s Civil War Triumphs

Tubman’s 1863 raid, which destroyed seven plantations along the Combahee River in South Carolina and freed 756 enslaved laborers, is now the subject of an exhibition in Charleston

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