How well can you do on this short quiz?

Sadly, a few people might be able to get most of them, most people won’t be able to get any of them. This is just not information the general public is taught in school.

Nowadays, we get a whole month that is allegedly dedicated to Women’s History. But, even then, we’re never taught all that much. So, screw the month — let’s take the year.

With that said, here’s a new series I’ve been planning to start. A sort of “On this day in history…” series. Just a chance to spread some knowledge about the amazing feats of women in our world.

Since it’s already January 16, this first post will be a bit longer than the rest will be, since I’ll be going back to the 1st.

So, here goes.

On this day in history:

January 1

1990: (A First) In a ground-breaking precedent, The Johns Hopkins Medical Institutions and six other medical centers began a major four-year study of heart disease in post-menopausal women. Previous research on heart disease focused entirely on men - with not one single woman being studied although all findings were automatically assumed to be effective for women. They are not. The research seeks to determine whether the administration of certain hormone drugs can help reduce heart disease in post menopausal women. Studies would show that men and women respond differently to many drugs and that women are often prescribed drugs which are not effective for them. Researchers would have to be forced into doing further research on women health because they always claimed that they dared not because of possible pregnancies and fetal injury.

January 2

1890: (A First) Alice B. Sanger of Indianapolis broke 100 years of tradition by becoming the first woman to be employed by the executive branch of the United States government for something other than domestic service. She was hired as a stenographer to President Benjamin Harrison.

1974: (Court Decision) A federal court struck down as unconstitutional a Georgia law that forbade a woman from voting in Georgia if her husband maintained a legal residence in another state.

1991: (A First) Sharon Dixon (Kelly) sworn in as mayor of Washington D.C. becoming the first black woman to head a city of that size.

January 3

1900: (A First) Florence Woods becomes the first American woman to get an automobile driving permit.

1933: (A First) Minnie Davenport Craig becomes Speaker of the North Dakota House of Representatives - the first woman to hold the position of speaker of the House in a state legislature.

1939: (A First) Hired for only one day, Gene Cox, 13, becomes the first female page for the U.S. House of Representatives.

1964: (A First) Colonel Barbara J. Bishop was appointed to serve as head of the U.S. women marines and served until 01-31-1969. When she took office, there were 1,500 women marines and within four years the number had almost doubled as she fought for increased assignments for the women, pushed for women officers to be appointed to career military colleges, and better living conditions. She was the first woman Marine to retain her rank of Colonel as the “little ladies” restrictions against permanent higher ranks for women was lifted by Congressional/Presidential orders in 1967.

1793: (Birthday) Lucretia Mott, an organizer of 1848 women’s rights meeting in Seneca Falls, NY, born in Nantucket, Massachusetts.

January 4

1939: (A First) Dr. Frieda Wunderlich becomes the first woman dean of a graduate school.

1965: (A First) Patsy Mink sworn in as U.S. representative from Hawaii, becoming the country’s first Asian American congresswoman.

January 5

1925: (A First) Nellie Tayloe Ross takes oath of office in Wyoming, becoming the first woman to become a state governor. (She was named the Democrat’s candiate one month before the general election, after her husband, William Ross, the current governor, died of appendicitis. She was appointed the first woman Director of the U.S. Mint by Franklin Roosevelt a few years later.)

1995: (A First) Myra C. Selby, became the first woman and the first black member of the Indiana State Supreme Court.

January 6

1913: (A First) Clara Munson becomes the mayor of Warrenton, Oregon, the first woman mayor on the West Coast of the U.S.

1973: (A First) An electoral vote is first cast for a woman, Theodora Nathan, Libertarian party candidate from Oregon for U.S. vice president.

January 7

1955: (A First) Marian Anderson debuts with the Metropolitan Opera in New York City — the first Black singer to perform with the
Metropolitan Opera.

January 8

1925 (A First) When the three members of the Texas State Supreme Court had to disqualify themselves, Gov. Pat Neff appointed three women to hear and determine a case regarding the Woodman of the World, thus becoming the first (and only) State Supreme Court of all women.

1975: (A First) For the first time in U.S. history, a woman, Ella Grasso of Connecticut, takes office as the first woman governor elected in her own right.
(A First) Betty S. Murphy, first female member of the National Labor Relations Board, is named its chair.

January 9

1873: In the foremost scandal of the day, Victoria Woodhull, publisher, was arrested for writing that renowned preacher Henry Ward Beecher had committed adultery. The postal authorities charged her with sending obscene literature through the mail. She was acquitted of the charge. What made the event more newsworthy is that Beecher was subsequently sued for alienation of affections by Theodore Tilton. The jury and the public found Dr. Beecher innocent but found Mrs. Tilton GUILTY.

1859 (Birthday) Carrie Chapman Catt, suffrage leader and strategist, born in Ripon, Wisconsin.

1990: (Court Decision) Through a case filed in 1985 by Chinese-American Dr. Rosalie Tung, the U.S. Supreme Court unanimously struck down the university practice of keeping their tenured rolls and information secret. The decision said a university accused of discriminating in tenure must make the relevant personnel files available to Federal investigators. Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which in 1972 Congress extended to educational institutions prohibits employment discrimination based age, sex, national origin, or religion. Dr. Tung had been denied tenure at the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School of Business which she left to became Wisconsin Distinguished Professor and director of the International Business Center at the University of Wisconsin.

January 10

1918: U.S. House of Representatives passes proposed constitutional amendment giving women the right to vote.

1860: A five-story brick textile factory in Lawrence, Massachusetts collapsed because cheap building were materials used by the owners. The building, 300 by 85 feet, had heavy machinery on the upper floors. The workers on the lower floors were mostly mill girls. Ninety people died and hundreds crippled in the catastrophe. Many trapped in the rubble were burned to death. The building owners were not prosecuted. Owner greed that replaced decent mill working conditions of the early 19th century would soon turn Laurence into the the site of violent labor reform disputes, led by such firebrand union organizers as Emma Goldman and Mother Jones.

1870: (Birthday) Maud Younger, labor organizer and suffragist, born in San Francisco, California.

January 11

1897: (A First) Martha Hughes Cannon of Utah becomes first female state senator.

1977: AT & T approves dual listings in phone books for wife and husband without extra charge, ending a three-year battle by feminists.

January 12

1932: (A First)Hattie Caraway elected from Arkansas, first woman elected to U.S. Senate.

1948: (Court Decision) The U.S. Supreme Court ordered the State of Oklahoma to provide Ada Lois Fisher, a Negro, with the same education is offered white students. Five days later the Supreme Court of Oklahoma ruled the state must establish a separate but equal law school for Fisher who had been barred from entering the University of Oklahoma Law School because of her color.

January 13

1810: (Birthday) Ernestine Rose, women’s rights activist, born in Poland.

January 15

1810: (Birthday) Abigail Kelley Foster, public speaker for women’s rights, born near Amherst, Massachusetts.

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