mayvaneday/women.md

The big list of women who did things

Unfinished, obviously.

Last updated: 2022-10-20

Art

• Aphra Behn: one of the first English women to earn her living by her writing
• Diemoth: 12th-century recluse who transcribed at least forty-five manuscripts; notable for her "beautiful handwriting"
• Enheduanna: first known poet
• Herrad of Landsberg: 12th-century nun who wrote an early pictoral encyclopedia, Hortus deliciarum, to teach the women in her convent about the sciences of the time
• Murasaki Shikibu: wrote the first novel, The Tale of Genji

Computers

• Ada Lovelace: the first computer programmer
• Margaret Hamilton: lead programmer on the Apollo project
• Grace Hopper: created the first compiler
• Susan Kare: "pioneer of pixel art"; designed many of the icons, fonts, and images for Apple, NeXT, and IBM in the 1980s
• Hedy Lamarr: invented Wi-Fi

Industry

• Tabitha Babbitt: invented the circular saw
• Katharine Burr Blodgett: invented non-reflective (invisible) glass
• Josephine Cochrane: invented first commercially successful dishwasher
• Bette Nesmith Graham: invented Liquid Paper
• Margaret Knight: invented the paper bag machine
• Stephanie Kwolek: invented Kevlar

Medicine

• June Almeida: discovered the coronavirus group of viruses
• Leila Denmark: synthesised the first vaccine for pertussis (whooping cough)
• [Rosalind Franklin](https://wikipedia.org/wiki/Rosalind Franklin]: discovered the double-helix formation of DNA
• Barbara McClintock: discovered that genes can move between chromosomes
• Rita Levi-Montalcini: discovered nerve growth factor
• Andromachi Papanikolaou: key factor in the development of the pap smear test
• Candace Pert: discovered the opiate receptor in the brain
• Mildred Catherine Rebstock: first person to synthesise chloromycetin (an antibiotic)
• Trota of Salerno: first gynecologist
• Nettie Stevens: discovered that chromosomes determine sex
• Flossie Wong-Staal: proved that HIV causes AIDS

Science

• Patricia Bath: inventor of the Laserphaco Probe
• Ethel Bauer: planned lunar trajectories for the Apollo program, critical to 13's safe return
• Jocelyn Bell Burnell: discovered first pulsar
• Annie Jump Cannon: developed the first stellar classification system; classified almost 400,000 stars
• Mary Jackson: NASA's first Black female engineer
• Mae Jemison: first Black woman in space
• Katherine Johnson: mathematician crucial for the success of the first USA spaceflights
• Mary Kenner: inventor of the menstrual pad; holder of the record for the most patents awarded to a Black woman in the USA
• Inge Lehmann: discovered the Earth has a solid inner core
• Lise Meitner: discovered nuclear fission
• Mary Sherman Morgan: invented hydyne (a liquid rocket fuel)
• Cecilia Payne: discovered what the universe and sun are made of
• Clarice Phelps: part of the team that discovered element 117 (tennessine); first Black woman involved with the discovery of a chemical element
• Vera Rubin: discovered dark matter
• Seondeok of Silla: set up first astronomy tower in Asia
• Donna Strickland: winner of the 2018 Nobel Prize in Physics for the practical implementation of chirped pulse amplification
• Judy Sullivan: biomedical engineer for the Apollo 11 spaceflight
• Maria Telkes: co-built first solar-power-heated heated home with Eleanor Raymond
• Marie Tharp: mapped the floor of the Atlantic Ocean; proved the theory of continential drift
• Chien-Shiung Wu: first woman to become president of the American Physical Society; worked on the Manhattan Project and proved that parity is not conserved
• ...and many more

Social Change

• Judith Heumann: held the longest sit-in in a government building for the enactment of Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973 (civil rights protection for disabled people)

Misc

• Marie Van Brittan Brown: co-invented home security surveillance
• Bessie Coleman: first Black woman to earn an international pilot's license; first known female aviator
• Elizabeth Magie: created the progenitor to the Monopoly board game