Elizabeth Ann Herring grew up in a lower-middle-class family in Oklahoma. She excelled in debate and got a scholarship to George Washington University. At 19, she paused her studies to start a family with her high school sweetheart and devoted herself to raising a daughter and a son. Only later in life did she resume her career – got a Doctor of Law degree, started lecturing in Rutgers School of Law, University of Texas Law School, and University of Pennsylvania Law School. Warren became well known as Harvard Law School bankruptcy expert. In her public work, she served as an adviser to the National Bankruptcy Review Commission and was appointed as a special adviser to the new Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. She published several books, including two popular volumes about middle-class economics, co-authored with her daughter. The two made the bold statement that “sending mothers to work has made families more vulnerable to financial disaster than ever before.” In 2012 she ran for Senate and became the first female Senator from Massachusetts. She was re-elected in 2018. In 2019 she declared herself as a candidate for president. The official launch of her campaign was made in Lawrence, Massachusetts. The location was chosen to reference the historic 1912 labor strike led by immigrant women textile workers. In March 2020 (during Women’s History Month), Warren suspended her bid for the 2020 Democratic nomination, following a disappointing showing in early primary contests. Elizabeth Warren shaped her political agenda around wealth re-distributive policies: criticizing Wall Street after the financial crisis, proposing a wealth tax and free childcare. She is one of the wealthiest presidency candidates with over $2.59 million worth. Read more...

During her long and productive career, Rich published more than 30 books of poetry and essays. In her writing, she explored issues of gender, racism, consumerism, class privilege, and politics. She was considered a radical figure in Second Wave Feminism, yet she was accepted by the institutions, won many awards, and is now considered a classic. The first one was for the collection of poetry, which she published at 22. The same year she graduated from Radcliffe College. Adrienne Cecile Rich was born in Baltimore, MD, and over the years she taught English, poetry, and creative writing at several institutions, including Swarthmore College, Columbia University, City College of New York, and Scripps College in Claremont. Among her most influential works, were two texts that dissected heterosexuality and motherhood as socially constructed institutions. In both cases, she provided a critical perspective toward every woman’s freedom to choose. In the case of Compulsory Heterosexuality, for example, she presented the notion of Lesbian Continuum as an alternative way of thinking about the variety of relationships between women. Both in her poetry and her non-fiction writing, the honestly spoke of taboos, like that of motherhood. In her book “Of Woman Born”, she points out to the difference between motherhood as an experience and an imposed political institution. Her mother was a concert pianist who put her career aside to raise her family, while her father developed his career as an academic. Rich embodied the feeling that she was the benefactor of her mother’s sacrifice. When awarded the 1973 National Book Award, she declared that she accepted it on behalf of all women and shared it with her fellow nominees, Alice Walker and Audre Lorde. In 1997 she refused the National Medal of Arts, she did so to express her critique of the Clinton administration. Her famous quote from the refusal letter stated: “art means nothing if it simply decorates the dinner table of the power which holds it hostage”. By her thirties, she was married and had three children. After her husband’s suicide, she had a relationship with novelist and poet Michelle Cliff. Read more...

Born Elizabeth Cabot Cary to a prominent Boston family, she received education at home. Her life mission was to pave the way for women to have equal access to higher education. As a first step, at the age of 33, she established a home school for female students, hosting Harvard faculty lecturers. Later she co-founded Harvard Annex, which was chartered as Radcliffe College in 1894, granting degrees to women. Her exceptional approach was to insist on merging the college with Harvard. That vision materialized only a century later in 1999, with the establishment of the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study at Harvard. In 2007 Harvard University appointed its first female president, Catharine Drew Gilpin Faust. Along the way, her vision was supported by her husband. She married the Swiss scientist Louis Agassiz at 28, raising his children from a previous marriage, never having her own. The couple became partners in family and professional life. She co-organized his expedition to Brazil, and together they wrote the popular book ‘A Journey in Brazil.’ After her husband’s death, when she was 70 years old, she traveled to explore the Pacific Coast. She co-authored several books, including her husband’s biography. Read more...