Five Women Who Changed History

With the celebration of Women’s History Month, public awareness of women’s accomplishments over the ages will be at an all-time high. Highlighted below are five women who made their mark on the world and continue to provide inspiration for all people to this day: 

 

Harriet Beecher Stowe, 1811 – 1896

Harriet Beecher Stowe impacted the world through her work as an advocate for a slavery-free society. Her novel Uncle Tom’s Cabin became a major work of literature in the anti-slavery movement, helping to popularize and define the movement’s central beliefs. 

 

Mary Wollstonecraft, 1759 – 1797

Mary Wollstonecraft is famous for having written A Vindication of the Rights of Women, a touchstone work in the early feminist movement. The tract made a powerful and compelling argument for increasing the human and political rights of women. Her efforts to improve women’s lives made her a pioneer in the battle for female suffrage.

 

Rosa Parks, 1913 – 2005

Rosa Parks is a woman who proved how a single brave action can reverberate through the world with positive effects. She was an African-American civil rights activist who rose to fame when she refused to give up her bus seat for a white passenger. Her courage and conviction sparked the history-making Montgomery Bus Boycott, and she became an iconic figure in the struggle against racial segregation.

 

Harriet Tubman, 1820 – 1913

Harriet Tubman started out as a slave and ended up as a celebrated figure in the abolitionist movement. Working with the Underground Railroad, a network of antislavery activists, she rescued a large number of slaves. She also participated as a Union spy during the American Civil War and was the first woman to lead an armed expedition in the war (which freed over 700 slaves). Later in her life she also became a major activist in the women’s suffrage movement.