On September 23rd, 2018, the city of Randwick unveiled a bronze sculpture of renowned English cellist Jacqueline du Pré at Kensington Park. The Music & Opera Singers Trust commissioned the statue, and the artist Drago Marin Cherina created it. Jaqueline du Pré (1945-1987) was one of the world’s greatest cellists of all time; she performed at the most prestigious venues and brought excitement to the world of classical music. Her statue in Australia was one of the first statues in the continent to honor a female musician. Standing in front of the Kingsford Community Centre, the statue has inspired visitors and honored du Pré’s legacy. Jaqueline du Pré became passionate about playing cello when she was four. She studied at the prestigious Guildhall School of Music in London and continued learning with the best cellists in Europe, including Pablo Casals (Switzerland), Mstislav Rostropovich (Russia), and Paul Tortelier (France). In 1961, at 16, she made her formal cellist début at Wigmore Hall in London, impressing Britain’s music critics. Du Pré recorded and performed worldwide, captivating audiences, receiving international recognition, and becoming one of the most beloved cellists in the world. In 1967, at 22, she married Israeli pianist and conductor Daniel Barenboim, and the two became known as the golden couple of the music industry. In 1971, du Pré started losing sensitivity in her fingers, accompanied by fatigue and depression. Two years later, she was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis. Her last studio recording was in 1971, and she stopped performing live in 1973. Her passion for music never declined, and she continued to teach music as long as her health permitted it. At the age of 42, she passed away. Read more...

On January 5th, 2023, Australian legendary women’s cricketer Belinda Clark made history again when her statue was unveiled at the Sydney Cricket Ground (SCG) and became the first statue of a woman cricketer worldwide. The SCG decided in 2021 that after 73 statues of male cricketers in Australia, the time has come to honor a female player. The SCG selected Belinda Clark from a list of talented players, and the artist Cathy Weiszmann won the commission to create it. Weiszmann sculpted the statue based on a photo she and Clark chose; it stands near two of Australia’s finest men’s captains: Richie Benaud and Steve Waugh. Belinda Clark was born in 1970 in Newcastle, New South Wales, and grew up playing cricket and tennis. She started playing cricket more seriously in high school and made her international cricket debut in January 1991, playing against New Zealand. Two years later, and for 12 years, Clark became the captain of the Australian Women’s team, winning two ICC Women’s World Cups trophies (1997, 2005), 15 Test matches, and scoring 919 runs at an average of 45.95. Clark became the first person to score an ODI double century in 1997, blasting 229 runs off 155 balls against Denmark. She has held the record for the most ODI runs scored by an Australian woman – 4,844 runs in 118 ODIs at an average of 47.49. In 2000, Clark became the CEO of Women’s Cricket Australia (WCA), playing a significant role in the merger with the Australian Cricket Board to combine the administration of the men’s and women’s games. After her retirement in 2005, Clark held several roles in the Australian Cricket Board and also served as the manager of the Australian Cricket Academy (till 2017). Since 2002, the Belinda Clark Award recognizes Australia’s best women’s international cricketer. In 2014, Clark was inducted into the Australian Cricket Hall of Fame. Read more...

Etta Lucille Reid Baker (1913-2006) was born in North Carolina to a family of African-American, Native American, and European-American heritage. From a young age, her father, Boone Reid, a musician who played the Piedmont blues, taught her to play the guitar and the Piedmont blues style. Baker worked several jobs since she was a teenager, contributing to the family’s income and occasionally playing with her father and sister at dances and parties. In the summer of 1956, when Baker lived in Morganton, North Carolina, married, and had nine children, her father asked the folksinger Paul Clayton to listen to her music. Clayton recorded five pieces of Baker and included them in the 1956 album Instrumental Music of the Southern Appalachians. It was one of the first commercially released recordings of African-American banjo music. Only in 1973, after several years of being a widow, Baker retired from the textile industry to focus on music. In 1991, she released her first album, One Dime Blues, followed by three more; the last one, an all-banjo instrumental recording, was released posthumously. Until her 90th birthday, Baker performed in folk festivals and concerts nationwide, spreading the Piedmont blues, influencing many musicians, and winning prestigious awards. Several years after her death, the people of Morganton decided to commemorate Baker’s legacy. In 2015, the Etta Baker exhibit opened in the local auditorium. Two years later, on May 25th, a sited statue of Baker by the sculptor Thomas Jay Warren was unveiled outside the Morganton Municipal Auditorium, immortalizing Baker playing her guitar. Read more...

On October 6th, 2009, during the weeklong celebration of the “Centennial of Women at Marquette,” Marquette University dedicated a 6.5-foot bronze statue of Mother Teresa on the west side of the St. Joan of Arc Chapel. Mother Teresa (1910-1997) was born as Anjezë Gonxhe to a Kosovar Albanian family in what now resides in North Macedonia. In the early years of her life, she decided to dedicate herself to religious life and became a missionary. At 18, Anjezë joined the Sisters of Loreto in Ireland to learn English. A year later, she moved to India, took her religious vows, and changed her name to Mary Teresa after Thérèse de Lisieux, the patron saint of missionaries. In 1950, she founded the Missionaries of Charity, a congregation of women that would care for: “the hungry, the naked, the homeless, the crippled, the blind, the lepers, all those people who feel unwanted, unloved, uncared for throughout society, people that have become a burden to the society and are shunned by everyone.” The Missionaries of Charity grew outside of India to have over 4,500 nuns operating in more than 500 missions in over 100 countries as of 2012. The Roman Catholic Church canonized her in 2016. Among the many awards she received were the Nobel Peace Prize (1979) and the Pere Marquette Discovery Award from Marquette University (1981). The Kuttemperoor Family donated the statue to the university; the Calcutta-based artist Guatam Pal, who is famous for sculpting more than 50 statues of Mahatma Gandhi all around the world, created it, depicting Mother Teresa wearing her traditional sari and holding an infant. Next to the statue, a plaque summarizes Mother Teresa’s accomplishments and her famous quote: “If you can’t feed a hundred people, then feed just one.” Read more...

Lilian Jeannette Rice (1889-1938) grew up in National City, San Diego County, CA, a few miles from the Mexican border. In 1910, she graduated from the School of Architecture at the University of California at Berkeley with an architecture degree, becoming one of the first female architects in the country. A year later, she completed a teaching degree. Caring for her ill mother brought her back to her hometown, where she worked as a teacher and draftsman for Hazel Wood Waterman, the first female architect of San Diego. In 1921, Rice started working as an associate in the office of Richard Requa and Herbert Jackson. Soon she got the Rancho Santa Fe project and became its core designer, planning the masterplan, houses, and commercial buildings. In 1927 Rice received her architect license and opened her office in 1928. She continued designing homes for Rancho Santa Fe and even moved there, took occasional trips to Spain, and worked on projects in the San Diego area, till her death from ovarian cancer in 1938. Rice was known to design in the Spanish Colonial style, with “restraint in decoration, high-quality craftsmanship and harmony between a home and its site.” Several of her buildings were added to the National Register of Historic Places. On Lilian Rice Day, October 26th, 2021, the Rancho Santa Fe community unveiled a statue honoring Rice. A Roaring ’20s-themed gala held by the Rancho Santa Fe Historical Society followed the community ceremony. Peggy Brooks, the former vice president of the Rancho Santa Fe Historical Society, initiated the idea to commemorate Rice with a statue. Jenny Freeborn and the Rancho Santa Fe Historical Society commissioned the local artist Nina de Burgh to sculpt it. Read more...

Along the banks of the Arkansas River stands the bronze bust of one of Arkansas heroines, Daisy Gatson Bates. Gatson Bates (1914-1999) grew up with foster parents in a segregated environment in Arkansas, learning about racism and discrimination against African-Americans firsthand. In 1941, she and her husband settled down in Little Rock; she became an active member of the NAACP’s local branch and, several years later, its president. The Bates established the Arkansas State Press, writing about civil rights issues, promoting desegregation, and celebrating stories of inspiring black Arkansans. In 1957, Bates decided to change the status quo after several years had passed since the Supreme Court’s decision that segregated schools were unconstitutional. She chose nine students to enroll in the all-white Little Rock Central High School. She supported, protected, and mentored the students during the enrollment and school period, which later became known as the Little Rock Integration Crisis. Bates and the Little Rock Nine faced death threats and opposition from the white students’ parents, local mob groups, and the Arkansas government. In 1960, after a year in which all the public schools in Little Rock were closed, they opened with no segregation. Bates stayed in touch with the Little Rock Nine through their years in school. After years of activism work, Bates died in Little Rock at age 85. Read more about her life story here. The bust was created by the renowned sculptress Jane DeDecker who also sculpted the other two monuments that honor women on the banks of the Arkansas River. The first is the Harriet Tubman statue, and the second is the Women’s Suffrage statue called Every Word We Utter, which commemorates the national suffrage leaders Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Susan B. Anthony, Harriet Stanton Blatch, Sojourner Truth, Alice Paul, Ida B. Wells, alongside Little Rock’s Bernie Babcock, and Josephine Miller Brown. Below the bust, a plaque reads: “When hate won’t die, use it for good.” Read more...

On June 7th, 2023, Nebraska dedicated the statue of the author Willa Cather to the National Statuary Hall Collection. Her statue is the 12th statue honoring a woman in the collection, the first of a Pulitzer Prize winner, and the first that an African-American sculptor created. Willa Cather (1873-1947) relocated from Virginia to frontier Nebraska when she was 9. Soon she started writing and publishing in local newspapers. At 16, Cather studied science at the University of Nebraska–Lincoln while continuing to write, edit and publish in journals and magazines. Soon, she realized writing was her true passion and changed her major to English, graduating in 1895. Cather moved to Pittsburgh and worked as a writer and editor in local newspapers and as a teacher in several high schools. At 30, she published her first poetry collection, followed by her first short stories collection. Nine years later, while living in New York City, Cather published her first novel, the first of 12 she would write. She became known for portrayals of the frontier, pioneering settlers, and their relationships with the western landscapes, often drawing inspiration from her experiences and the people she encountered while growing up in Nebraska. In 1923, Cather won the Pulitzer Prize for the novel One of Ours (Published in 1922). In her lifetime, she wrote 12 novels, two poetry books, and seven short story collections (three were published post-mortem). The sculptor Littleton Alston won the commission for the statue. He depicted Cather as a confident writer at around age 40, holding pen and papers in her left hand and a walking cane in her right, walking in the Nebraska prairie, the scenery of many of her writings. Next to her on the ground are the Nebraska state flower, the goldenrod, and the Nebraska state bird, the Western meadowlark). A snake ring on her left hand and the embroidered details wool jacket represent her love of fashion. The pedestal reads: “Willa Cather AUTHOR 1873- 1947 “The history of every country begins in the heart of a man or a woman.” O PIONEERS!” Read more...

On the opening day of the 2019 US Open, the trailblazer African-American professional tennis player Althea Gibson got the recognition she deserved when her statue got dedicated outside Arthur Ashe Stadium, the biggest tennis stadium in the world, named after the pioneer African-American tennis player, Arthur Ashe. Althea Gibson (1927-2003) played tennis as a kid in Harlem, New York City. She started playing professionally in her teenage years and, from 1947 to 1957, won the American Tennis Association women’s titles. In 1950, Gibson became the first African-American to compete in the US Nationals. A year later, Gibson started competing internationally and made her Wimbledon debut. In 1956, she became the first African-American athlete to win a Grand Slam tournament at the French Championships singles event. She also won the doubles title with Briton Angela Buxton. Until her retirement in 1958, Gibson won 56 national and international singles and doubles titles, including 11 majors, and was the first black player to win the French Open, Wimbledon, and the US Nationals. Gibson had accomplished all that while struggling financially and suffering from racism in many places she competed. After retiring, she played professional golf for a while, becoming the first Black player to compete on the Women’s Professional Golf Tour and join the Ladies Professional Golf Association. Among those involved in the campaign to place Gibson’s statue were the legendary tennis player Billie Jean King and former president and CEO of the Us Tennis Association, Katrina Adams. The sculptor Eric Goulder created it, depicting Gibson’s bust on five granite blocks. Her quote is inscribed on one of the blocks: “I hope that I have accomplished just one thing: that I have been a credit to tennis and my country.” An augmented reality experience, narrated by Billie Jean King, provides the visitors with information about the life story and accomplishments of Gibson. Another statue of Gibson stands in New Jersey. Read more...

A historic house museum that showcases the local history and features photos and artifacts relating to the iron mining industry. The story of the house began in 1854 when an Irish immigrant built it. In 1879 he sold it for $300 to Bridget Smith (1835-1907), a young widow with two children who lost her husband, John, in an accident while working in the mines. During the 19th century, when New Jersey’s northwestern part was an iron mining area, the area was called Mine Hill and later Irishtown. In 1912, Jessie and Ida McConnell rented the house, and Ida lived there for 78 years. In 1993, Smith’s great-grandchildren donated the house to Mine Hill to preserve it as the Bridget Smith Homestead. The house was restored and added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1998. The Ferromonte Historical Society manages the museum, holds guided tours, and organizes special events. The museum is part of the New Jersey Women’s Heritage Trail, along with the Women’s Federation Monument. Read more...

At a small square near the port of Durrës stands a bronze statue of the American Queen of Rock and Roll, Tina Turner, next to bronze statues of other legendary musicians: Mick Jagger, Bob Dylan, and John Lennon. Turner is posing in her famous performance outfit, a mini-dress, and high heels, holding a microphone. Tina Turner (1939-2023) was born Anna Mae Bullock in Brownsville, Tennessee. She started her music journey in the church choir in Nutbush and Brownsville when she lived with her grandparents. After graduating high school, and frequently visiting R&B clubs, she joined Ike Turner’s band, the Kings of Rhythm. Soon, she became the lead vocalist and adopted the stage name Tina Turner. Not long after, she and Ike became a couple, married, toured the US, and released numerous singles, gaining national popularity. After a long time of suffering Ike’s physical and mental abuse, Tina, at 37, escaped, leaving everything behind. She kept a lower profile for several years to recover. Then, at 45, Tina released her first solo album, Private Dancer, positioning her on the world map as a leading and inspiring singer and performer. Throughout her career, Turner recorded ten albums, sold 200 million records, went on dozen worldwide tours, and received hundreds of awards and honors. She died at 83 in Switzerland. Turner performed in Eastern Europe on several of her tours, and even though she had never visited Albania, her popularity there has always been high. Also, her life story of suffering from domestic abuse for years and lifting herself to become a superstar singer inspired the Albanians, who suffered from several deadly conflicts and harsh life under the communist regime. Her statue has been a popular visiting place where people take pictures with her. Read more...