Discover the Women of the Hall

Author who produced the first literature for the mass market of juvenile girls in the 19th century. Her best-known work, Little Women, has appeared continuously in print since its first publication in 1868-69.

First African American singer to perform with the Metropolitan Opera. An international star, Anderson was a brilliant musician whose talents helped shatter the color barrier for other African American performers.

Zoologist whose concern over the damaging effects of pesticides and other poisons on the environment led to her groundbreaking work, Silent Spring. Carson’s book was a catalyst for the environmental movement of today.

American impressionist painter who captured the soul of family life, women, children, interiors and gardens. A friend and student of the great Impressionists of Paris, Cassatt powerfully influenced American art.

Trail-blazing journalist considered to be the “best reporter in America” who pioneered investigative journalism.

A missionary who dedicated her life and fortune to aid Native Americans and African Americans, Saint Katharine Drexel is only the second recognized American-born saint. In 1891, Saint Katharine founded the Sisters of the Blessed Sacrament, a religious order that today remains devoted to the education and care of Native Americans and African Americans. During her lifetime, Saint Katharine and her order founded more than sixty missions and schools, including Xavier University of Louisiana. Saint Katharine was beatified in 1988 and canonized in 2000.

A philanthropist, Dorothy Harrison Eustis combined her love of animals and her passion for helping others to co-found the nation’s first dog guide school, The Seeing Eye. In 1921, Eustis began her career in Switzerland, breeding German shepherds for civic duty. She was later contacted by Morris Frank, a blind American man seeking a guide dog. After bringing Frank to Switzerland and providing him with a dog, Eustis returned to the United States, and in 1929, they established The Seeing Eye to help blind people achieve greater independence, dignity and self-confidence through the use of Seeing Eye dogs. To date, The Seeing Eye has bred and trained 15,000 dogs to assist nearly 8,000 men and women.

A pioneering chemist, Helen Murray Free conducted research that revolutionized diagnostic testing in the laboratory and at home. Free is the co-developer of Clinistix, the first dip-and-read diagnostic test strips for monitoring glucose in urine. Along with her husband, Alfred Free, she also developed additional strips for testing levels of key indicators for other diseases. Today, dip-and-read strips make testing for diabetes, pregnancy, and other conditions available in underdeveloped regions of the United States and in foreign countries. Free is the recipient of numerous awards, including the National Medal of Technology and Innovation and the American Chemical Society’s 66th National Historic Chemical Landmark designation (2010).

One of the greatest artists of the 20th century, she created a new dance language.  Named Dancer of the Century, she was the first dancer to perform at the White House and to act as a cultural ambassador abroad.

Microbiologist whose landmark discovery that pathogenic bacteria communicate with each other via a system known as “quorum sensing” served as the foundation for an entire field of study and has led to drug development to interrupt the bacterial communication process.

Susan Kelly-Dreiss has worked for over 30 years to enact legal protections, implement innovative services and heighten public awareness on behalf of battered women and their children. In 1976, Kelly-Dreiss lobbied for passage of Pennsylvania’s first domestic violence law, and later that same year, she co-founded the nation’s first domestic violence coalition, the Pennsylvania Coalition Against Domestic Violence (PCADV). She was a founding member of the National Network to End Domestic Violence, and has played a key role in drafting federal legislation including the Federal Violence Prevention and Services Act and the Violence Against Women Act.

Interested in science and medicine from a young age, Kwolek graduated from Carnegie Institute of Technology and then took a job at DuPont Chemicals to save for graduate studies. However, her love of working with polymers kept her at DuPont, where she discovered the fiber that led to the development of Kevlar, a bulletproof material five times stronger than steel. Kwolek is the recipient or co-recipient of 17 U.S. patents.

An attorney, civil rights activist and humanitarian, Allie B. Latimer was instrumental in organizing Federally Employed Women (FEW) in 1968, and served as the organization’s founding president until 1969. In 1977, as a federal attorney, Latimer was the first African American and first woman to serve as General Counsel of a major federal agency as well as the first African American and first woman to attain the GS-18 salary level at the General Services Administration. She was also recognized as part of the ‘second wave of feminist pioneers’ by the Veteran Feminists of America (VFA).

She is a world record holding athlete, ground-breaking high fashion model, beacon for design tech, dedicated advocate, and avant-garde actor. She conceived of, and was the first to wear and compete in, prostheses modeled after the hind legs of a cheetah – now the international standard for amputee runners.

Writer and editor, her expose of the Standard Oil Trust in the 1904 publication The History of the Standard Oil Company prompted the federal government to prosecute and break up Standard Oil for anti-trust violations. She founded the American Magazin, authored several biographies, and, in spite of her 1912 anti-feminist book, The Business of Being a Woman, remains a role model for women and men in journalism.