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- December 1, 1761 – Marie Tussaud, French sculptor, founded Madame Tussaud’s Wax Museum, hired to make death masks of victims of the guillotine during the French Revolution, barely escaping the guillotine herself. In 1802, she brought her work to London to exhibit, and spent the rest of her life in the British Isles.
- December 1, 1900 – Karna Birmingham born, Australian artist, illustrator and print maker, best known for her illustrations of children’s books. She wrote and illustrated Skippety Songs in 1934, but in 1938, she contracted trachoma, an infection that roughens the inner eyelid, which damaged the cornea, limiting her sight, and her career
Book Cover by Karna Birmingham
- December 1, 1910 – Dame Alicia Markova born as Lilian Marks, English ballerina and choreographer-director; notable for her career with Sergei Diaghilev's Ballets Russes, and as Prima Ballerina for the company that would become the Royal Ballet, was the first to perform several of Frederick Ashton’s early ballets
- December 1, 1926 – Mother Antonia Brenner born as Mary Clarke, American Roman Catholic religious sister and activist, who had a dream of being imprisoned awaiting execution and Jesus visiting her in 1969. But she was barred by church rules from joining any religious order because she was an older divorced woman. She began the work she felt called to, caring for prisoners at the notorious maximum-security La Mesa Prison in Tijuana Mexico, and founded an order for women like herself, the Eudist Servants of the Eleventh Hour. In addition to her normal work with the prisoners, she negotiated an end to a riot, and also persuaded the jail administrators to discontinue prisoner incarceration in substandard cells known as the tumbas (tombs). In 2003, her religious community was formally approved by Rafael Romo Munoz, Bishop of the Diocese of Tijuana. In September 2009, she received the Peace Abbey Courage of Conscience Award, presented at the Joan B. Kroc School of Peace Studies at the University of San Diego
- December 1, 1937 – Vaira Vīķe-Freiberga born, Latvian politician and academic; the first woman President of Latvia (1999-2007), noted for her leading role in Latvia becoming part of the European Union and NATO; she was a professor of psychology at the University of Montreal (1965-1998), teaching psychopharmacology, psycholinguistics, scientific theories, experimental methods, language and cognitive processes. Her experimental research focused on memory processes and language, and the influence of drugs on cognitive processes. At the same time she did scholarly research on semiotics, poetics and the structural analysis of computer-accessible texts from an oral tradition—the Latvian folksongs. She is fluent in French, English and Latvian. In 1998, she returned to Latvia to become Director of the newly founded Latvian Institute. She was drafted by the Saeima (Latvian Parliament) as a candidate for President of Latvia in 1999, and won the election, then was re-elected in 2003. In 2005, UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan named Vīķe-Freiberga as a member of his team of global political leaders helping to promote his comprehensive reform agenda. The Baltic States named her as their candidate for UN Secretary-General in 2006. She is a founding member and current President of the Club of Madrid, a forum of former Heads of State, and Co-Chair of the Nizami Ganjavi International Center, which is a global center for developing new ways to bring about peace
- December 1, 1945 – Bette Midler, American singer-songwriter, actor and producer; founder of the New York Restoration Project, to revitalize neglected neighborhood parks, and formed a coalition that saved a number of community gardens from being sold off by the city for commercial development. Midler is active in helping wounded U.S. military men and women and their families with resources and customizing homes to meet the needs of persons with disabilities. She has also done several tours for the USO
- December 1, 1955 – Karen Tumulty born, American journalist; national political correspondent for The Washington Post. Previously wrote for Time magazine (1994-2010) on Washington DC politics, after 14 years at the Los Angeles Times (1980-1994)
- December 1, 1958 – Candace Bushnell born, American journalist, columnist, novelist and television producer; her column for the New York Observer was anthologized as the bestselling book Sex and the City, which became the basis for the hit TV series Sex and the City
- December 1, 1961 – Safra Catz, Israeli-born American business executive, currently Co-CEO of Oracle Corporation since 2014
- December 1, 1964 – Jo Walton born in Wales, Welsh-Canadian Fantasy and science fiction writer, winner of a Nebula, a Hugo, the World Fantasy Award, a Mythopoeic Award, and the John W. Campbell Award for Best New Writer; noted for her Sulien, Small Change and Thessaly series
- December 1, 1976 – Laura Ling born, American journalist and writer; in 2014, she became Director of Development at Discovery Digital Networks; previously producer of the Vanguard television documentary series; in 2009, she and fellow journalist Euna Lee were detained in North Korea, accused of illegally entering the country and “hostile acts” when they attempted to film refugees along the North Korean border with China. They were tried and sentenced to 12 years in a labor prison, but U.S diplomatic efforts, and a visit to North Korea by former President Bill Clinton, secured their release after two months
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- December 2, 1501 – Queen Munjeong born, Korean queen, Regent of Korea (1545-1565) for her son, King Myeongjong, who was 12 when he was crowned; Munjeong noted as a good administrator and for giving land to common people which had been owned by the nobility, but she also remained the real power long after her son reached his majority
Royal seal of Queen Munjeong 1547 gilt bronze
- December 2, 1895 – Harriet Cohen born, British concert pianist and activist who aided refugees from the Nazis during WWII; she played a duet concert with Albert Einstein in 1934 to raise money to bring Jewish scientists out of Nazi Germany; she was a Zionist and pleaded with the British to allow more Jewish refugees to settle in Palestine; for a concert tour in Russia in 1935, she began to learn music by Russian composers like Shostakovitch who were little-known outside of their country, and helped to popularize their music by playing it in her concerts all over Europe
- December 2, 1909 – Joan Hoskyn Davies born on Robben Island, where her father was a medical doctor; South African archivist, beginning her career at the Cape Archives Depot (1935-1944), then transferred to the Transvaal Archives Depot (1944-1957); in 1957, she was appointed head of the new Liaison Department, and in 1966 became the head of the Cape Archives Depot, the first woman to earn the title ‘archivist’ and the first to head an archives depot, holding the position until her retirement in 1974; member of the executive committee of the Society of Civil Servants (1946-1959), and chair of the SCS central women’s committee (1957-1959)
- December 2, 1967 – Mary Creagh born, British Labour politician; Member of Parliament for Wakefield since 2005; Labour Party Group Leader on Islington London Borough Council (2000-2004)
- December 2, 1969 – Ulrika Bergquist born, Swedish journalist and television presenter; newsreader on TV4 News
- December 2, 1969 – Tanya Plibersek born, Australian Labor politician; Deputy Leader of the Opposition and Deputy Leader of the Labor Party since 2013; Minister for Health and Medical Research (2011-2013); Minister for Human Services and for Social Inclusion (2010-2011); Minister for Housing (2007-2010); Member of the House of Representatives since 1998
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- December 3, 1857 – Mathilde Kralik born, Austrian composer; studied at the Conservatory of the Society of Friends of Music (1876-1878), graduating with a diploma in composition and a Silver Society Medal; her compositions were popular with fin de siècle concert-goers in Austria, but not well-known outside her homeland
- December 3, 1937 – Morgan Llywelyn born in the U.S., American-Irish author of historical fantasy, historical fiction, and historical non-fiction, who writes for adults and young readers, including Lion of Ireland, a New York Times bestseller; The Horse Goddess, winner of ALA Best Novel for Young Adults award; and Strongbow: The Story of Richard and Aoife, winner of the Bisto Award for Excellence in Children’s Literature
- December 3, 1956 – Ewa Kopacz born, Polish Civic Platform politician; the second woman Prime Minister of Poland (2014-2015); Leader of the Civic Platform Party (2014-2016); the first woman Marshal of the Sejm (Polish Parliament’s lower house – 2011-2014); Minister of Health (2007-2011) Deputy to the Sejm (2001-2014)
- December 3, 1960 – Julianne Moore born, American Academy Award winning actress, and author of the Freckleface children’s book series
- December 3, 1974 – Lucette Rådström born, Swedish journalist and television presenter for TV4 since 1998
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- December 4, 1777 – Juliette Bernard Récamier born, French leader of a salon that attracted the leading literary and political figures of Paris; she became an icon of neoclassicism; married at age 15 to Jacques-Rose Récamier, a banker who was almost 30 years her senior (apparently the marriage was never consummated); in spite of her husband’s heavy financial losses, beginning in 1805, and his death in 1830, which left her in even more reduced financial circumstances, she continued to receive visitors in her apartment in a building that had been a convent, where she lived from 1819 until her death from cholera in 1849. The récamier, a type of chaise longue, is named for her
- December 4, 1829 – In the face of fierce local opposition, British Governor-General Lord William Bentinck issues a regulation declaring that anyone who abets suttee in Bengal is guilty of culpable homicide – the rest of British India follows his lead
Burning of an Indian Widow from a book by the Reverend James Peggs
- December 4, 1883 – Katherine Susannah Prichard born in Fiji, Australian author; co-founding member of the Communist Party of Australia, and member of the Movement Against War and Fascism; noted for her political activism, organizing left-wing women’s groups and unemployed workers, for her novels, Working Bullocks and Coonardoo, and her short story collection, Kiss on the Lips. Because of her political activities, she was frequently harassed by Western Australia police, and the Australian government kept a surveillance file open on her from 1919 until her death in 1969
- December 4, 1961 – The female contraceptive ‘Pill’ becomes available on the National Health Service in Britain
- December 4, 1966 – Suzanne Malveaux born, twin sister of Suzette M. Malveaux; American television journalist; former NBC Pentagon correspondent; moderator of the 2007 National Association of Black Journalists convention; a key reporter in CNN’s 2004 and 2006 election coverage; CNN White House correspondent; co-anchor of Around the World (2012-2014)
The Malveaux sisters
- December 4, 1966 – Suzette M. Malveaux born, twin sister of Suzanne Malveaux; lawyer and professor of law at the Columbus School of Law; expert on civil rights law and class action litigation; appeared before the U.S. Supreme Court in Wal-Mart v. Dukes, a gender discrimination in pay and promotion suit
- December 4, 2011 – Hundreds of protesters in Singapore demonstrate against sexual violence against women, as part of the global ‘SlutWalk’ movement, a rare public protest in the tightly controlled city state
- December 4, 2015 – Defense Secretary Ash Carter announces that the Pentagon is opening all combat jobs in the U.S. military to women. Women who meet entry standards will now be able to serve in any unit, including the elite Navy SEALs, Army Special Forces, and the Marine Corps infantry
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- December 5, 1830 – Christina Rossetti born, English poet and author; noted for her poetry collection, Goblin Market and Other Poems, which was lauded by Gerald Manley Hopkins, Algernon Swinburne, and Alfred, Lord Tennyson; she spoke against slavery, the exploitation of underage girls in prostitution, and cruelty to animals; her poem,“In the Bleak Midwinter” was set to music as a Christmas carol by Gustav Holst
- December 5, 1896 – Ann Nolan Clark born, American writer and teacher who taught at the Tesuque Pueblo school, a first-through-fourth grade one-room-schoolhouse, for 25 years; many of her stories are inspired by students; the U.S. Bureau of Indian Affairs published 15 books based on her Pueblo experiences; In My Mother’s House, illustrated by Pueblo artist Velino Herrera, was a 1942 Caldecott Honor book
- December 5, 1926 – Felicia Adetoun Ogunsheye born, Nigerian professor of Library and Information Science at the University of Ibadan; she was the first woman to graduate from the Yaba College of Technology, the first Nigerian woman to earn BA and MA degrees at Newnham College, Cambridge University, and the first woman professor in Nigeria. She established the Abadina Media Resource Centre Library of the University of Ibadan. In 1973, she became a full professor at University of Ibadan. Appointed as the dean of faculty of education at Ibadan (1977-1979), the first woman to become a dean in any Nigerian university. Noted for advocating that African libraries should reinvent their foundations from their colonial masters, documenting oral data and cultures into the system
- December 5, 1943 – Eva Joly born Gro Farseth in Norway; French politician for Europe Écologie–The Greens; Member of the European Parliament for Île-de-France; French juge d’instruction (investigating magistrate); outspoken critic of political corruption, advocate for stopping all nuclear energy production in France, and deriving 40% of France’s energy needs from renewable resources by 2020; also wants higher tax rates on the wealthy and a minimum 17% corporate tax rate on multinational companies; author of “La Force qui nous manque” (The Force We Lack)
- December 5, 1951 – Anne-Mie van Kerckhoven born, Belgian artist known for painting, computer art and video art; former member of noise band Club Moral
Zwevend (Floating), by Anne-Mie van Kerckhoven - 1999
- December 5, 1953 – Gwen Lister born in South Africa, Namibian journalist, publisher, apartheid opponent and freedom of the press activist; co-founder of The Namibian newspaper in 1985 and was the first female editor of a southern African newspaper. Some of Lister’s reporting landed her in jail without trial, including a 1988 report based on a secret document about planned new police powers. Revealing the plans “at least ensured they were never implemented,” she said. Lister is a founding member of the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists and now heads the Namibian Media Trust, which trains journalists and promotes media freedom and access to information. The Nambian was fire bombed several times, the worst in 1991, after the paper published a story about a possible coup attempt, and the perpetrators, who were never caught, used phosphorous grenades and burned the newsroom to the ground. She won the 1992 International Press Freedom Award from the Committee to Protect Journalists, and the 2004 Courage in Journalism Award from the International Women’s Media Foundation
- December 5, 1968 – Margaret Cho born, American comedian, author, and singer-songwriter; best known for her stand-up routines, with commentary on race and LGBT rights; creator and star of the sitcom All-American Girl (1994-1995); has won awards for her humanitarian efforts on behalf of women, Asian Americans and the LGBT community; author of I’m the One That I Want and I Have Chosen to Stay and Fight
- December 5, 1968 – Lydia Millet born, Canadian-American novelist; noted for her third novel, My Happy Life, which won the 2003 PEN Center USA Award for Fiction
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- December 6, 1905 – Elizabeth Yates born, American author and journalist; began her career contributing articles, mainly on travel to The Christian Science Monitor and The New York Times; among her many books, written mostly for young readers, she is noted for Mountain Born, a Newbery Honor book in 1944, and Amos Fortune, Free Man, a biographical novel about a real person, which won the 1951 Newbery Medal for Excellence in American children’s literature
- December 6, 1908 – Herta Taussig Freitag born in Austria, Austrian-American mathematician; professor of mathematics at Hollins College; known for her work on the Fibonacci numbers; she earned her masters at the University of Vienna in 1934, and was working there until 1938, when her father, editor of Die Neue Freie Presse, came under threat by the Nazis for having editorialized against them, and she emigrated with her family to England, where she had to work as a maid because English immigration laws prevented her from entering the country as a teacher. Her father died in 1943, and she, with her mother and brother. moved to the U.S., where she was able to resume teaching mathematics at the Greer School (1944-1948). She earned a second masters degree (1948) and her PhD (1953) from Columbia University. She joined the faculty at Hollins College in 1948, and later became a full professor and department chair. In 1962, she was the first woman to serve in her section as section president for the Mathematical Association of America; she was a frequent contributor to the Fibonacci Quarterly, which dedicated an issue to her for her 89th birthday (89 is Fibonacci number)
- December 6, 1949 – Linda Barnes born, America mystery writer; noted for her Carlotta Carlyle series; her story “Lucky Penny” won the Anthony Award for Best Short Story, and A Trouble of Fools, her first Carlotta book, won the Edgar Award for Best Novel
- December 6, 1964 – Mall Nukke born, Estonian Artist, painter and printmaker, known for her paintings, collages and installations
Still Life I, by Mall Nukke
- December 6, 1989 – Montreal Massacre: Anti-feminist gunman murders fourteen women at the Ėcole Polytechnique. Now Canadian National Day of Remembrance and Action on Violence Against Women, White Ribbon Day
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- December 7, 1878 – Akiko Yosano born as Shō Hō, Japanese author, poet, pioneering feminist, and social reformer. Published in 1901, Midaregami (Tangled Hair), her first of several collections of tanka, a traditional Japanese poetry form, contained around 400 poems, the majority of them love poems. It was denounced by most literary critics as vulgar or obscene, but was widely read by free-thinkers, as it brought a passionate individualism to this traditional form, unlike any other work of the late Meiji period. The poems defied Japanese society’s expectation of women to always be gentle, modest and passive. In her poems, women are assertively sexual. These are the first tankas in which a poet writes specifically of women’s breasts, not vaguely as a symbol of child feeding and motherhood, but in terms of a woman’s sexual pleasure. In 1911, her poem “The Day the Mountains Move” announces that women will demand equality. She frequently wrote for the all-women literary magazine Seitō (Bluestocking). Yosano disagreed with a prevailing opinion of Japanese feminists of the time that the government should provide financially for mothers, saying dependence on the state and dependence on men are really the same thing. Even though she gave birth to 13 children, 11 of whom survived to adulthood, she rejected motherhood as her main identity, saying that limiting a sense of self to a single aspect of one’s life, however important, entraps women in the old way of thinking. In a 1918 article, Yosano attacked “the ruling and military class which deliberately block the adoption of a truly moral system in an effort to protect the wealth and influence of their families…They hurry to invoke the power and precepts of the old totalitarian moral codes to direct the lives of Japanese citizens,” and called militarism “barbarian thinking which is the responsibility of us women to eradicate from our midst.” In her later years, she supported her country’s military ambitions and the glory of dying for the Emperor, but most of these poems are regarded as lacking the brilliance and originality of her earlier work
- December 7, 1900 – Kateryna Bilokur born, Ukrainian folk artist, noted for her paintings of flora and natural landscapes
Everything goes everything passes (1950),
by Kateryna Bilokur
- December 7, 1913 – Kersti Merilaas born, Estonian poet and translator from German who also wrote books for children, plays and the libretti for three operas by Estonian composer Gustav Ernesaks; one of the poets in the literary circle known as Arbujad (“Soothsayers”). She became a member of the Estonian Writers Association, but was forced to resign in 1950 after Soviet annexation of Estonia for promoting “bourgeois nationalism”
- December 7, 1915 – Leigh Brackett born, American author, primarily of science fiction, The Sword of Rhiannon and The Hounds of Skaith; screenwriter on The Big Sleep, The Long Goodbye and The Empire Strikes Back; dubbed the ‘Queen of Space Opera’
- December 7, 1978 – Suzannah Lipscomb born, British historian, academic and television presenter; worked at Hampton Court Palace organizing a series of exhibitions marking the 500th anniversary of Henry VIII’s accession to the English throne (2009), which won an Arts and Humanities Research Council KTP Award for Humanities; lecturer in history at the University of East Anglia; elected as a Fellow of the Royal Historical Society in 2011. Noted for her books on Henry VIII, Tudor England, and women in 16th century France
- December 7, 1998 – U.S. Attorney General Janet Reno declines to seek an independent counsel investigation of President Clinton’s 1996 campaign financing
- December 7, 2014 – Anne Hidalgo, newly elected as the first woman Mayor of Paris, calls for diesel cars to be banned from the French Capital by 2020, in order to reduce pollution. A partial car ban had already been imposed in March, 2014, as the capital’s air was found to be close to the record for worst air quality
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- December 8, 1626 – Christina, Queen of Sweden, born; she succeeded to her father’s throne at the age of six, but was crowned and took power when she was 18, reigning until her abdication in 1654. She was one of the most educated women of the 17th Century, interested in literature, the Arts, religion, philosophy, mathematics and alchemy. Her decision not to marry caused a scandal, then she compounded it by abdicating her throne and converting to Roman Catholicism, and moving to Rome. She was the guest of five consecutive Popes, as a symbol of the Counter Reformation. Upon her death in 1689, she was one of the few women to be buried in the Vatican grotto
Christina Queen of Sweden - by David Beck
- December 8, 1660 – A woman – likely Margaret Hughes, but possibly Anne Marshall – appears on an English public stage for the first time, in the role of Desdemona in a production of Shakespeare’s play Othello
- December 8, 1943 – Mary Woronov born, American actress, author and painter; best known as an Andy Warhol superstar in his avant-garde art films, but she is the author of several books, including Snake, Blind Love, and Swimming Underground: My Years in the Warhol Factory
- December 8, 1961 – Conceição Lima born, a poet, broadcaster and producer for the BBC Portuguese Language Services, from the island São Tomé in São Tomé and Príncipe, just north of the equator off the western coast of Africa. She studied journalism in Portugal, then worked in radio, television and the press in São Tomé. In 1993, she founded and edited O País Hoje (The Country Today). Her first book of poetry, O Útero da Casa (The Uterus of the House) was published in 2004, followed by A Dolorosa Raiz do Micondó (The Dolorosa Root of Micondo) in 2006. She also holds degrees in Afro-Portuguese and Brazilian Studies from King’s College London
- December 8, 1969 – Kristin Lauter born, American mathematician and cryptographer, noted for research in application of number theory and algebraic geometry in cryptography. Researcher and head of the Cryptography Group at Microsoft Research. President of the Association for Women in Mathematics (2015-2017), and co-founder of the Women in Numbers Network, a research collaboration community for women in numbers theory. Co-winner of the Selfridge Prize at ANTS III for their paper, Computing Hilbert Class Polynomials. Fellow of the American Mathematical Society since 2015
- December 8, 1976 – Zoe Konstantopoulou born, Greek lawyer and currently a Course of Freedom politician and speaker. Previously, Konstantopoulouwas affiliated with SYRIZA (Coalition of the Radical Left); she was Speaker of the Hellenic Parliament in 2015; Member of the Greek Parliament (2012-2015)
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- December 9, 1745 – Maddalena Laura Sirmen born in Venice, Italian violinist and composer; noted as one of the finest and most famous violinists and composers ever taught in a Venetian orphanage; married the renowned violinist Ludovico Sirmen, and they toured together, and sometimes composed music together, but she was also a notable composer in her own right
- December 9, 1890 – Laura Salverson (nee Guðmundsdóttir) born, Canadian author and poet whose work reflects her Icelandic heritage; her parents emigrated to Manitoba from Iceland in 1887; her first novel, The Viking Heart, was published in 1923; her novel, The Dark Weaver: Against the Sombre Background of the Old Generations Flame the Scarlet Banners of the New, and her autobiography, Confessions of an Immigrant’s Daughter won the Governor General’s Awards in 1937 and 1939. Immortal Rock: The Saga of the Kensington Stone won the 1954 Ryerson Fiction Award
- December 9, 1895 – Dolores Ibárruri born, known as “La Pasionaria” (the Passionflower), Spanish Republican hero of the Spanish Civil War and communist politician of Basque origin, known for her rallying cry “¡No Pasarán!” (They shall not pass) during the Battle for Madrid in November 1936. She joined the Spanish Communist Party (PCE) when it was founded in 1921, and in the 1930s, became a writer for the PCE periodical Mundo Obrero (Workers World.) In 1936, she was elected to the Cortes Generales (the Spanish legislature) as a PCE deputy for Asturias. She was exiled from Spain at the end of the Civil War in 1939; by 1942 she was appointed as General Secretary of the exiled Central Committee of the Communist Party of Spain (1942-1960.) From 1960 to 1977, she traveled extensively, and spent much time in Moscow. But in 1960, she ceded her post as secretary-general and was appointed as honorary president of the PCE. She wrote her first memoir, El Unico Camino (The Only Way), and after the Spanish government lifted the ban on the PCE, she applied for a visa to return to Spain, which was eventually granted in 1977. She ran for and was elected to the Cortes Generales (1977-1979), where she voted with a loud “Yes” for the new Spanish Constitution, but failing health prevented her from running again. She died at the age of 93 in 1987. Thousands of people came to pay homage as her body lay on a catafalque, before a cortege carried her body to the Plaza de Columbus for her eulogy, where a multitude of mourners chanted “¡No Pasarán!” and then she was buried in the Almudena Cemetery
- December 9, 1900 – Margaret Brundage born, American illustrator and painter, remembered for her illustrations in the pulp magazine, Weird Tales. She created most of the covers for the magazine between 1933 and 1938
Weird Tales Cover — September1941,
by Margaret Brundage
- December 9, 1906 – Esther E. Peterson born, American women’s rights and consumer advocate, teacher, organizer and lobbyist for labor; in the 1930s, she taught at the innovative Bryn Mawr Summer School for Women Workers in Industry, which brought milliners, telephone operators and garment workers onto the campus; in 1938, Peterson was a paid organizer for the American Federation of Teachers in the New England region. In 1944, Peterson became the first lobbyist for the National Labor Relations Board in Washington, D.C. In 1948, the State Department offered Peterson’s husband a position as a diplomat in Sweden. The family returned to Washington in 1957, and Peterson joined the Industrial Union Department of the AFL-CIO, becoming its first woman lobbyist. She was Assistant Secretary of Labor and Director of the U.S. Women’s Bureau under President John F. Kennedy. In 1964, President Lyndon Johnson named her to the newly created post of Special Assistant for Consumer Affairs. She later served as President Jimmy Carter’s Director of the Office of Consumer Affairs
- December 9, 1928 – Joan W. Blos born, American writer, teacher and advocate for children’s literacy; her historical novel, A Gathering of Days: A New England Girl’s Journal, 1830-32, won the 1980 U.S. National Book Award in Children’s Books, and the 1980 Newbery Medal for the year’s most distinguished contribution to American children’s literature
- December 9, 1934 – Dame Judi Dench born, highly regarded English theatre and film actor; performed in companies of the National Theatre and the Royal Shakespeare; a seven-time Oscar nominee and one-time winner, and a six-time British Academy Film Award winner. She is an outspoken critic of prejudice in the movie industry against older actresses. She stated in 2014, “I’m tired of being told I’m too old to try something. I should be able to decide for myself if I can’t do things and not have someone tell me I’ll forget my lines or I’ll trip and fall on the set.” She is an active supporter of the UK disabled people’s charity Revitalise, and of Survival International, which campaigns in defence of tribal people – the San of Botswana and the Arhuaco of Colombia in particular
- December 9, 1944 – Ki Longfellow born, American novelist, playwright, theatrical producer and director, with dual citizenship in Britain; best known in the U.S. for her novel The Secret Magdalene, the first of her works to explore the divine feminine. Some of her other books are mysteries, including her Sam Russo noir series set in the late 1940s
- December 9, 1962 – Roxanne Swentzell born, Santa Clara Pueblo sculptor and ceramicist who studied at the Institute for American Indian Arts in Santa Fe, New Mexico, and the Portland Museum Art School in Oregon. Her first public exhibit was at the annual Santa Fe Indian Market in 1984; in 1986, she won eight awards for her sculpture at the Market. In 1994, she won the Market’s Creative Excellence in Sculpture award. Some of her work is displayed at Smithsonian’s National Museum of the American Indian
Roxanne Swentzell - ‘The Making of Oneself’
- December 9, 1966 – Kirsten Gillibrand born, American attorney and Democratic politician; U.S. Senator from New York since 2009; member of the U.S. House of Representatives from New York (2007-2009); outspoken on the issues of sexual harassment, and on sexual assault in the military; member of the Senate Women’s Caucus, and ranking member of the Senate Armed Services Committee
- December 9, 1972 – Saima Wazed Hossain born, Bangladesh Autism activist; member of the World Health Organization (WHO) Expert Advisory Panel on mental health. Organized the first South Asia conference on Autism in 2011 in Dhaka, Bangladesh, and successfully campaigned for the “Comprehensive and Coordinated Efforts for the Management of Autism Spectrum Disorders” resolution adopted by the World Health Assembly. In 2016, she was elected as chair of the International Jury Board of UNESCO for Digital Empowerment of Persons with Disabilities, and in 2017 became the WHO Goodwill Ambassador for autism in the South-East Asia region; she was honored with the International Champion Award for her outstanding contributions
- December 9, 2004 – Canada’s Supreme Court rules that same-sex marriage is constitutional
- December 9, 2017 – Australia becomes the 26th country to legalize same-sex marriage
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- December 10 is Namibian Women’s Day – honors women for their part in the struggle for independence. The ‘Old Location’ was an area created in 1912 to segregate Black residents of Windhoek, then the capital of South West Africa, which is now Namibia. In the 1950s, the Windhoek municipality and the South African colonial administration decided to forcefully moved the Black residents 5 miles (8 kilometers) north of the city. The Black residents had owned the erven (a plot of land, marked off for building purposes), but the municipality owned the new erven, which was a lot smaller, and communal gardens were not allowed. They would have to pay rent, and take buses to work. The new SWANU party organised protests and an effective boycott of municipal services. On December 10, 1959, police opened fire on protesters, killing 11 and wounding 44 others. Doctors at hospitals turned away the wounded, telling them “go to the United Nations for treatment . . . [as] political patients.”
- December 10, 1783 – María Bibiana Benítez born, Puerto Rico’s first woman poet and one of its first playwrights; she published her first poem in 1832, La Ninfa de Puerto Rico (The Nymph of Puerto Rico), which is also the best known of her poems. She also wrote the first dramatic play by a Puerto Rican, La Cruz del Morro (The Cross of El Morro) in 1862. She adopted the daughter of her brother Pedro José and his wife after they died. Her niece, Alejandrina Benítez de Gautier, would also become a notable poet
- December 10, 1811 – Caroline Mehitable Fisher Sawyer born, American poet, biographer, editor and translator of German literature; after a short time at a Baptist school, her uncle, an invalid but highly educated in science and literature, took over her schooling. Her poems began to be published in newspapers like the Burlington Sentinel and the Boston Evening Gazette when she was still a young girl. She became one of the most prolific writers of Christian Universalism after her marriage to Reverend Thomas J. Sawyer in 1831. She took over as editor of the Rose of Sharon in 1849, after being one of its most regular contributors since its inception in 1840. She also edited The Ladies’ Repository (1860-?) and the youth department of the Christian Messenger (1835-1847)
- December 10, 1869 – Women win the right to vote in the Wyoming Territory
- December 10, 1885 – Elizabeth Faulkner Baker born, American economist and academic who specialized in scientific management, and the relationship between employment and technological change, especially the role of women; she earned her M.A (1919) and Ph.D. (1925), both in economics, while teaching a Barnard College, where she became chair of the Department of Economics (1940-1952). During WWII, she also served as a hearing officer of the National War Labor Board
- December 10, 1922 – Agnes Nixon born, American television scriptwriter and producer; best known as the creator of the long-running soap operas One Live to Live (1968-2012) and All My Children (1970-2011). She introduced new storylines to U.S. daytime television: the first health-related storyline, the first storyline related to the Vietnam War, the first on-screen lesbian kiss and the first storyline about abortion. Nixon won 5 Writer’s Guild of America Awards, 5 Daytime Emmy Awards, and a Lifetime Achievement Award from the National Academy of Television Arts and Sciences
- December 10, 1931 – Jane Addams becomes a co-recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize, the first American woman to be honored
- December 10, 1939 – Allina Ndebele born, South African artist and master weaver, who established a small workshop in her father’s village to teach neighbourhood women to card, spin, dye and weave. In 2005, President Thabo Mbeki bestowed the Order of Ikhamanga in Silver on Ndebele for artistic excellence and her contributions in the creative arts
- December 10, 1942 – Ann Gloag born, Scottish co-founder of the international transport company Stagecoach Group, beginning with a single busline; and founder of the Freedom from Fistula Foundation
- December 10,1954 – Eudine Barriteau born, Barbadian professor of gender and public policy, Principle of the University of the West Indies, Cave Hill, Barbados; President of the International Association for Feminist Economics (IAFFE, 2009-2010); noted for her research on feminist theory, gender and public policy, Caribbean political economy, and theories on heterosexual women’s socio-sexual unions. Author of Confronting power, theorizing gender interdisciplinary perspectives in the Caribbean
- December 10, 1956 – Jacquelyn Mitchard born, American journalist and novelist, author of the best-selling novel, The Deep End of the Ocean, as well as A Theory of Relativity, Cage of Stars, No Time to Wave Goodbye, and Still Summer
- December 10, 1965 – Stephanie Morgenstern born in Switzerland, Canadian actor, filmmaker and screenwriter. Co-creator with her husband and writing partner, Mark Ellis, of the Canadian TV police drama Flashpoint (2008-2012). Morgenstern and Ellis wrote the third season of X Company, a WWII espionage thriller series. She also co-wrote and directed the short films Remembrance and Curtains
- December 10, 1966 – Penelope Trunk born as Adrienne Roston, American entrepreneur, author and blogger. Currently head of Quistic, an education company. She has been a business advice columnist for Fortune magazine and the Boston Globe, and writes a blog featuring career advice. Author of Brazen Careerist: The New Rules for Success and The Power of Mentors: The Guide to Finding and Learning from Your Ideal Mentor
- December 10, 1992 – Oregon Senator Bob Packwood apologizes for what he called “unwelcome and offensive” actions toward women, but refuses to resign
- December 10, 2004 – Wangari Maathai of Kenya receives the Nobel Peace Prize in Oslo, the first African woman to receive the prize. Maathai was a minister in the Kenyan government and founder of the Green Belt Movement
- December 10, 2012 – Unknown gunmen assassinate Nadia Sediqqi, a leading women’s rights activist and head of the Women’s Affairs Department of Laghman Province in Afghanistan. Her predecessor heading the department, Hanifa Safi, was murdered in July 2012 in a bombing that also killed her husband, after her repeated requests for police protection were ignored. According to Amnesty International, “. . . a number of Afghan women in public roles have been assassinated over the past 10 years.” Many Afghan women who are government officials work without the protection of bodyguards, making them especially vulnerable to attacks by religious extremists and others who oppose women’s presence in the workforce
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- December 11, 1910 – Mildred Cleghorn born aka Eh-Ohn or Lay-a-Bet, Chiricahua Apache, first chair of the Fort Sill Apache Tribe (1976-1995), educator and traditional doll maker. She was one of the last Chiricahua Apaches to be born under “prisoner of war” status; she worked as a home extension agent (a federal program through land grant colleges) and a home economics teacher. She was a cultural leader and worked to sustain the history and traditional culture of the Chiricahua people. Some of her dolls were exhibited at the 1967 Smithsonian Folklife Festival. In 1996, she was one of the plaintiffs from several tribes filing a class action lawsuit against the federal government for failure to properly manage Indian trust assets on behalf of all present and past individual Indian trust beneficiaries, Cobell v. Salazar, which was settled in 2009 for $3.4 billion USD in favor of the plaintiffs. Cleghorn died in 1997. The suit was finally settled one week after what would have been her 99th birthday if she had lived
- December 11, 1926 – ‘Big Mama’ Thornton born, American singer-songwriter
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- December 12, 1909 – Karen Morley born, American film actor, whose career began when she was seen by director Clarence Brown after working at the Pasadena Playhouse, and she became a stand-in for Greta Garbo in screen tests. She was soon signed by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, and cast in roles in major films in the 1930s like Mata Hara, Scarface, Dinner at Eight, and Our Daily Bread. In the 1940s, she was in several Broadway productions, but her career came to an end in 1947, when she appeared before the House Un-American Activities Committee and refused to answer questions about her alleged American Communist Party membership. After being blacklisted, she remained a political activist, and ran unsuccessfully for Lieutenant Governor of New York on the American Labor Party ticket. In the 1970s, she was cast in a few guest roles on TV series, and appeared in the 1993 documentary television series, The Great Depression, talking about the making of Our Daily Bread, and being overwhelmed by all the poverty and suffering during the Depression, in such contrast to her privileged life as a Hollywood actress
- December 12, 1955 – Gianna Angelopoulos-Daskalaki born, Greek shipping business executive, and politician. Elected to the Athens Municipal Council in 1986, and to the Greek Parliament in 1989. In 1998, she was appointed as Ambassador at Large by the Greek government. Angelopoulos-Daskalaki was also president of the Athens Organizing Committee for the 2004 Olympic Summer Games (2000-2005)
- December 12, 1964 – Reeta Chakrabarti born, English journalist, political correspondent and presenter for the BBC; patron of the National Mentoring Consortium, which links ethnic minority undergraduates with employers
- December 12, 1968 – Rory Kennedy born, American documentary filmmaker and social activist; her films focus on issues like addiction in Women of Substance, poverty in American Hollow, the international AIDS crisis in Pandemic: Facing AIDS, the hazards of nuclear power in Indian Point: Imagining the Unimaginable, labor history in Homestead Strike, and prisoners of war in Ghosts of Abu Ghraib, which won a 2007 Primetime Emmy Ward for Best Documentary. She is the daughter of Robert and Ethel Kennedy
- December 12, 1969 – Madeleine Sophie Townley born, whose pen names are Sophie Kinsella and Madeleine Wickham; English author noted for comic novels, including Can You Keep a Secret?, The Undomestic Goddess, Sleeping Arrangements and her Shopaholic series
- December 12, 1975 – Mayim Bialik born, American actor, author and neuroscientist
- December 12, 2013 – Hawaii becomes the 16th state to approve same-sex marriage
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- December 13, 1830 – Mathilde Fibiger born, Danish feminist, and novelist; she was the first public figure in Denmark to be an advocate for women’s rights. Fibiger wrote two pamphlets: Hvad er Emancipation? (What is Emancipation?) and Et Besøg (A Visit) which countered arguments against women’s equality. She worked as a private tutor in 1849, which was the inspiration for her novel, Clara Raphael, Tolv Breve (Clara Raphael, Twelve Letters). In spite of critical acclaim, her books were controversial but not very profitable, so she also worked as a dressmaker and translator. In 1863, she began training as a telegraph operator for the Danish State Telegraph service, which had just changed its policy, and began accepting women candidates. In 1866, she completed her training, and became the first woman employed as a telegraph operator in Denmark. After two years in Helsingør, she was transferred to Nysted in 1869 to manage a newly opened station. She encountered resistance from male operators, who saw the employment of a woman as a threat to their livelihood. In spite of her managerial position, her pay at Nysted was scarcely sufficient to pay her expenses. The following year, she applied for a transfer to the telegraph station in Aarhus, but also had difficulties with the station manager there. Her health, never robust, suffered under the stress, and she died in Aarhus in 1872. She is remembered in Denmark as a pioneering feminist, and as the woman who opened the door for women’s employment by the Danish State Telegraph service
- December 13, 1935 – Türkan Saylan born, Turkish medical doctor and dermatologist, writer, academic and social activist. Noted for her work on leprosy, and as the founder of the Fight Against Lepra Association and Foundation, and worked as the voluntary head of the Istanbul Lepra Hospital for 21 years
- December 13, 1950 – Linda Bellos born, British Labour politician, radical feminist, lesbian, and the first non-white lesbian to join the Spare Rib feminist collective in 1981; vice-chair of the successful Black Sections campaign to elect African Caribbean and Asian candidates for local and parliamentary races; Bellos was elected in 1985 as a councilor to Lambeth London Borough Council, and served as council leader (1986-1988); co-chair of the LGBT Advisory Group to the Metropolitan Police (2000-2003). She advocates for an inclusive approach to women’s issues, taking into account social class, minority and majority ethnic identity, disability, sexual identity and religion
- December 13, 1961 – Irene Sáez Conde born, Venezuelan politician; Governor of Nueva Esparta (1999-2000); Mayor of Chacao (a municipality of Caracas, 1993-1998); she was also the first woman to run for President of Venezuela in 1998, but was defeated by Hugo Chavez
- December 13, 1970 – Gerlinde Kaltenbrunner born, Austrian mountaineer; first woman to climb the 14 eight-thousanders without the use of supplementary oxygen or high altitude porters; won the 2012 National Geographic Explorer of the Year Award
- December 13, 1971 – Leanne Wood born, Welsh Plaid Cymru politician; first woman Leader of Plaid Cymru (2012-2018); Leader of the Opposition in the National Assembly for Wales (2016-2017); Member of the Welsh Assembly for Rhondda since 2016; Member of the Welsh Assembly for South Wales Central (2003-2016); she identifies as a socialist, republican and a proponent of Welsh independence
- December 13, 1974 – Sara Cox born, English broadcaster and presenter for BBC Radio; Currently host on BBC Radio 2 for Back in Time for . . . ; presenter on The Radio 1 Breakfast Show (2000-2003)
- December 13, 1976 – Rama Yade born in Senegal, French moderate-conservative politician and author; Regional Advisor of Île-de-France since 2010; Ambassador of France to UNESCO (2010-2011); Secretary of State for Sports (2009-2010); Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs and Human Rights (2007-2009); author of Noirs de France (Blacks in France) and Carnets du pouvoir (Diary of Power), as well as several other books on political issues. She identifies as a feminist
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- December 14, 1789 – Marianna Szymanowska born, Polish composer, and one of the first professional virtuoso pianists of the 19th century. After touring Europe extensively, she settled in St. Petersburg, and composed music for the Russian imperial court
- December 14, 1891 – Katherine MacDonald born, American actor and one of the first women to produce motion pictures, producing nine silent feature films for her company, Katherine MacDonald Pictures, from 1919 to 1921, including Passion’s Playground in 1920, which had an early featured part for Rudolph Valentino. She left the movie business after 1926, and ran a successful cosmetic business through the early 1930s
- December 14, 1904 – Virginia Coffey born, American social reformer and civil rights activist; in the 1920s, she taught at an all-black school in Cincinnati Ohio, and joined the local branch of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP); she worked for the YWCA in the early 1930s, and founded the first Girl Scouts troop for African-American girls in the 1940s. She was named Deputy Director of the Mayor of Cincinnati’s Friendly Relations Committee (1948-1962), working on integration of city swimming pools and parks. Director of Memorial Community Center (1965-1968), and executive director of the Cincinnati Human Relations Commission (1968-1973)
- December 14, 1939 – Ann Cryer born, British nuclear disarmament activist and politician; Member of Parliament for Keighley (1997-2010)
- December 14, 1956 – Linda Fabiani born, Scottish National Party politician; Deputy Presiding Officer of the Scottish Parliament since 2016; Convener of the Scottish Parliament Scotland Bill Committee (2011-2016); Minister for Europe, External Affairs and Culture and Minister for Gaelic (2007-2009); Member of the Scottish Parliament for East Kilbride since 2011; Member of the Scottish Parliament for Central Scotland (1999-2011); Fellow of the Chartered Institute of Housing of Scotland
- December 14, 1967 – Ewa Białołęcka born, Polish fantasy short story writer and novelist, noted for her Kroniki Drugiego Kręgu series, and short story collection Tkacz Iluzji; she is also a stained glass artist
- December 14, 1981 – Rebecca Jarvis born, American media journalist; Chief Business, Economics and Technology Correspondent for ABC News, and the host, creator and managing editor of Real Biz with Rebecca Jarvis and the podcast No Limits with Rebecca Jarvis
- December 14, 1985 – Wilma Mankiller takes office as the principal chief of the Cherokee Nation of Oklahoma, the first woman to lead a major American tribe in modern times
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- December 15, 1909 – Eliza Atkins Gleason born, the first African American to earn a Doctorate in Library Science, in 1940 from the University of Chicago; in 1941, she established and became the first Dean of the School of Library Service at Atlanta University and created a library education program that trained 90 percent of all African-American librarians by 1986. Gleason was also the first African American to serve on the board of the American Library Association (1942-1946)
- December 15, 1930 – Edna O’Brien born, Irish novelist, poet and short story writer; her first novel, The Country Girls, published in 1960, was banned by the Irish censorship board, and her family’s parish priest publicly burned copies of the book. But she also won the 1962 Kingsley Amis Award for The Country Girls. O’Brien left Ireland, and lives in London. Ironically, among many other honours for her work is the 2001 Irish PEN Award
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- December 16, 1843 – Josephine Shaw Lowell born, American charity worker and social reformer; first woman appointed to the New York State Board of Charities (1876-1889); founder of the New York Consumers League (1890) which advocated for better wages and working conditions for women, publishing a “White List” of retail stores which treated their women clerks well (which initially had few stores on it), and inspired chapters in other cities across the nation, becoming the National Consumers League, a powerful lobbying group
- December 16, 1895 –Marie Hall Ets born, American illustrator and children’s author; won the 1960 Caldecott Medal for her illustrations in Nine Days to Christmas, which she co-authored
- December 16, 1932 – Grace Alele-Williams born, first Nigerian woman to earn a doctorate degree and first woman to become a Nigerian university vice-chancellor, at the University of Benin. She is also a professor of mathematics education, and a consultant to UNESCO and the Institute of International Education Planning
- December 16, 1938 – Liv Ullmann born, Norwegian actress and film director; her first directing project was Sofie in 1992, followed by Faithless (2000), which was nominated for the Palme d’Or at the Cannes Film Festival, and in 2009, she directed Cate Blanchett in a stage production of A Streetcar Named Desire, which opened in Sydney Australia, then moved to the Kennedy Center in Washington DC. In 2014, her film adaptation of Miss Julie, starring Jessica Chastain, was released
- December 16, 1951 – Sally Emerson born, English novelist, poet, anthologist and travel writer; worked for the Illustrated London News, and as editor of Books and Bookmen (1978-1985). Her first novel, Second Sight, was published in 1980, and won the Yorkshire Post Best First Novel award. 1983’s Listeners was followed by the bestsellers Fire Child, Separation, Heat and Broken Bodies. She also edited several anthologies of both prose and poetry, and has been a travel writer for the Sunday Times since 2003
- December 16, 1976 – Jen Golbeck born, America computer scientist, academic and author; Associate Professor at the College of Information Studies, University of Maryland, College Park, and director of the University of Maryland Human–Computer Interaction Lab (2011-2014); noted for her work on computational social network analysis; program co-chair of ACM RecSys 2015; contributor to the on-line magazine Slate; she started The Freedom of Science Network after the last presidential election to help government scientists to find new jobs if they were fired, then used the network to ask for help in finding housing and work for scientists who were stranded by the administration's travel ban in 2017, and got 1,000 offers of help within 72 hours; her publications include Online Harassment (editor), and Trust on the World Wide Web: A Survey
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