March 29

This week we will finish our Women’s History Month announcements. The focus will be

women who were the first to do something in their field of study or expertise.

Sally Ride was an American astronaut and physicist. She joined NASA in 1978 and in 1983

became the first American woman in space. She remains the youngest American astronaut to

have traveled to space. She was just 32. After flying twice on the Challenger, she left NASA in

1987. She continued working primarily researching nonlinear optics and Thomson scattering.

She served on the committees that investigated the Challenger and Columbia Space Shuttle

disasters, the only person to participate in both. She died in 2012 of pancreatic cancer.

The first teacher in space was Christa McAuliffe. She was a high school teacher in Concord,

New Hampshire. She went through rigorous training and was selected as the first American

civilian to go into space but died tragically in the space shuttle Challenger explosion in 1986.

Tomorrow we will learn about Elizabeth Blackwell, the first woman physician in the United

States.

March 30

Today’s famous woman is Elizabeth Blackwell. She became the first modern woman to break

through the centuries old barrier to women practicing medicine. She first studied medicine on

her own with the help of tutors. Wanting more formal training, she applied to many medical

schools in the United States, but she was rejected by all of them because she was a woman.

Finally, she was admitted to Geneva Medical College in New York and received her M.D.

degree in 1849. She did her internship in England, but when she returned, no hospital would hire

her. So, she opened up a clinic with her sister in the slums of New York City. The clinic’s

success led to the women establishing the New York Infirmary for Women and Children, to

which they later attached a medical college for women, the first of its kind. She continued to

promote women in medicine through her activities in the medical community and her writings.

Tomorrow we will learn about the first woman to serve in the House of Representatives.

March 31

Today’s famous woman was the first woman to be elected to the House of Representatives. She

fought for women’s suffrage in Montana which granted women the right to vote in 1915. Two

years later she was elected to serve in the House of Representatives. She was an unrelenting

pacifist, who believed “You can no more win a war than you can win an earthquake.” She voted

against the US entering World War I. That vote cost the 1918 election. She then went on to

work as a lobbyist, social worker, and lecturer before being elected to the House again in 1940.

On December 8, 1940, she cast the only vote against the US declaration of war on Japan. She

remained devoted to her beliefs and at 87 led a “Jeannette Ranking Brigade” of 5,000 women in a march on Washington against US involvement in Vietnam .