Born: January 9, 1959, Guatemala Rigoberta Menchú Túm is a Guatemalan activist for human rights and for the rights of indigenous peoples. Born in northwestern Guatemala, Menchú grew up in a poor, traditional Quiché farming community in the highlands, the daughter of respected village elders. Extreme poverty and unsafe labour conditions led to the death […]
Born: May 3, 1898, KievDied: Dec 8, 1978, JerusalemGolda Meir was an Israeli premier (1969-74), a founder of the state of Israel. Meir was born on May 3, 1898, in Kyiv, Russia (now Ukraine), and originally named Goldie Mabovitz or Mabovich. Her father immigrated to Milwaukee, Wisconsin, in 1905, and was joined by his family
Born: 1046, Lucca, TuscanyDied: July 24, 1115, Bondeno, Romagna Matilda was the countess of Tuscany remembered for her role in the conflict between the papacy and the Holy Roman emperor. The climax of this struggle, the confrontation of the emperor Henry IV and Pope Gregory VII, took place at Matilda’s castle of Canossa.The assassination in
Born: December 8, 1542, Linlithgow Palace,West Lothian, ScotlandDied: February 8, 1587, Fotheringhay Castle, Northamptonshire, EnglandMary was the queen of Scots, also Mary Stuart daughter of James V, king of Scotland, by his second wife, Mary of Guise. Born in Linlithgow in December 1542, Mary became queen before she was a week-old baby. Raised in France,
Born: November 2, 1755, Vienna, AustriaDied: October 16, 1793, Paris, France Marie-Antoinette was the queen consort of Louis XVI of France; her unpopularity helped discredit the monarchy in the period before the French Revolution. Born in Vienna on November 2, 1755, Marie-Antoinette was one of the daughters of Holy Roman Emperor Francis I and Empress
Born: May 13, 1717, ViennaDied: Nov 29, 1780, Vienna Maria Theresa was the arch duchess of Austria and queen of Hungary and Bohemia (1740-1780), who strengthened and unified the Austrian monarchy in the 18th century. Born in Vienna on May 13, 1717, she was the daughter of Holy Roman Emperor Charles VI. In 1736, she
Born: 1353, Søborg, DenmarkDied: Oct 28, 1412, FlensburgMargaret I or Margrethe I was the queen of Denmark and Norway and of Sweden and founder of the Kalmar Union. She was born in Soborg, Denmark, the youngest issue of King Waldemar IV Atterdag, and as a child she was married to King Håkon VI of Norway.
Born: September 26, 1936, Bizana, Pondoland district, Transkei [now in Eastern Cape], South Africa Winnie Mandela is a South African political activist, known for advocating militant resistance to apartheid, a policy of rigid racial segregation legally enforced in South Africa until 1991. Originally named Nomzamo Madikizela, she was born in Bizana, in what is now
Born: April 1, 1940, Nyeri, Kenya Maathai is a Kenyan politician and environmental activist who was awarded the 2004 Nobel Prize for Peace, the first black African woman to win a Nobel Prize.Maathai was educated in the United States at Mount St. Scholastica College (now Benedictine College; B.S. in biology, 1964) and at the University
Born: Sept 2, 1838, Honolulu, Hawaii [U.S.]Died: Nov 11, 1917, Honolulu Liliuokalani or Lydia Kamekeha was the queen of Hawaii from 1891 to 1893. Born in Honolulu, Hawaii, Liliuokalani became Queen of Hawaii in 1891. Four years earlier, American businessmen, who were seeking United States annexation of Hawaii, had successfully gained constitutional reforms. In 1893,
Born: 718, Nara, JapanDied: Aug 28, 770, NaraKoken was the last empress to rule Japan until the 17th century; she twice occupied the throne (749-758; 764-770). There had been a number of female rulers before Koken, but the power achieved by the Buddhist monk Dokyo during her second reign caused the Council of Ministers to
Born: Nov. 19, 1926, Duncan, Oklahoma, U.S. Jeane Jordan Kirkpatrick American political scientist and United States ambassador to the United Nations from 1981 to 1985. Kirkpatrick was born in Duncan, Oklahoma. She graduated from Barnard College in 1948 and received her master’s and doctoral degrees in political science from Columbia University.From 1955 to 1972, Kirkpatrick
Born: April 21, 1879, Majong, Java [Indonesia]Died: Sept 17, 1904, Rembang Regency, Java Kartini was a Javanese noblewoman whose letters made her an important symbol for the Indonesian independence movement and for Indonesian feminists.The daughter of a Javanese aristocrat working for the Dutch colonial administration as governor of the Japara Regency (an administrative district), Kartini
Born: c. 1412, Domrémy, Bar, FranceDied: May 30, 1431, Rouen; canonized May 16, 1920; feast day May 30; French national holiday,second Sunday in May Joan of Arc, Saint, in French, Jeanne d’Arc called the Maidof Orléans was a national heroine and patron saint of France, who united the nation at a critical hour and decisively
Born: 1914, Chu-ch’eng, Shantung province, ChinaDied: May 14, 1991 Jiang Qing or Chiang Ch’ing was a Chinese social and cultural activist, third wife of Mao Zedong and leader of the Gang of Four. Jiang became an actor in the 1930s, using the stage name Lan Ping (Lan P’ing). In 1937 she joined the Chinese Communist