Legally blind since childhood, Olympic track and field athlete and marathon runner Marla Runyan never let her vision loss stand in the way of her athletic dreams.

Among the most famous women in early American history, Pocahontas is credited with helping the struggling English settlers survive.

Maria Mitchell was the first female astronomer in the United States and the first American scientist to discover a comet.

Considered one of the earliest American feminists, Anne Hutchinson was a spiritual leader in colonial Massachusetts who challenged male authority.

Undeterred by deafness and blindness, Helen Keller rose to become a major 20th century humanitarian, educator and writer.

Female labor activist “Mother Jones” was a self-proclaimed “hell-raiser”.

Julia Ward Howe was a writer, lecturer, abolitionist and suffragist.

A hero of the American Revolution, Margaret Cochran Corbin was the first woman to receive a military pension.

Prudence Crandall bravely defied prevailing patterns of racial discrimination when she opened one of the first schools for African American girls in Connecticut in 1833.

Rachel Carson catalyzed the global environmental movement with her 1962 book Silent Spring.

Carrie Chapman Catt was a suffragist and peace activist who helped secure for American women the right to vote

Ruby Bridges was only six years old when she became the first African American to attend her elementary school.

Clara Barton was an educator, humanitarian, and founder of the American Red Cross.

Elizabeth Blackwell was the first American woman to receive a medical degree.

Isabella “Belle” Boyd was was one of the most famous female Confederate spies, hailed by some as the “Cleopatra of Secession.”

Mary McLeod Bethune was one of the most important Black educators, civil and women’s rights leaders and government officials of the twentieth century.

Catharine Esther Beecher was a nineteenth century teacher and writer who promoted equal access to education for women.