Maria Mitchell, 1818-1889

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An educator and the first professional astronomer in the US.

Maria Mitchell was born and raised in a Quaker family in Nantucket, Massachusetts. Her father was a schoolteacher and amateur astronomer, and from a young age, Mitchell helped him operating his astronomical instruments. She attended the North Grammar school, and at 11, she transferred to the school her father founded, where she was a student and a teaching assistant. Later, she attended Cyrus Peirce’s school for young ladies, where she also worked as a teaching assistant.

At 17, Mitchell established her own school, allowing nonwhite children to attend, while the local public school was segregated. Mitchell developed unconventional teaching methods, which she applied in all her teaching positions. She did not report grades or absences, she taught in small classes to individualized attention, and she incorporated mathematics and technology in every lesson.

In 1836, at the age of 18, Mitchell began working as a librarian in the Nantucket Atheneum, a job she held for the next 20 years. At nights, she continued assisting her father with geographical calculations and astronomical observations for the US Coast Survey.

On October 1, 1847, using a two-inch telescope, the 29 years old, Mitchell had noticed an unknown object flying through the sky, discovering the Comet 1847 VI. Later, the comet will be called “Miss Mitchell’s Comet.” Following her discovery, Mitchell gained national and international acclaim, becoming a celebrity in scientific circles with hundreds of articles written about her and receiving numerous awards, including a gold medal prize presented to her by the King of Denmark. In the following year, Mitchell became the first woman elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, as well as the first to enter the American Association for the Advancement of Science. At 31, Mitchell moved to Boston to work as an official “computer” for the US Nautical Almanac Office, becoming one of the first women to work for the federal government.

In 1865, at 47, with no college education, Mitchell was appointed as the first professor of astronomy and director of the observatory at the new Vassar College. Her research varied, studying Jupiter, Saturn, and their moons, as well as nebulae and solar eclipses. Between 1868 to 1873, Mitchell and her students began a daily recording of sunspots, providing the first consistent photographs of the sun. As a professor, she broke social conventions, insisting that her female students will come to nightly observations. During her two decades at Vassar College, Mitchell and her students frequently published their findings in various academic journals.

Mitchell was involved in numerous social issues throughout her life, including the anti-slavery movement and women’s suffrage. She was friends with Sojourner Truth, Frederick Douglass, and Elizabeth Cady Stanton and brought women’s rights activists to Vassar’s observatory to give lectures. Mitchell was a founding member and second president of the Association for the Advancement of Women (AAW) and headed a special committee on Science, promoting and analyzing women’s progress in the field. Mitchell died of brain disease at the age of age 70.

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“Study as if you were going to live forever; live as if you were going to die tomorrow.”

“Study as if you were going to live forever; live as if you were going to die tomorrow.”

Fun Facts

  • She was the third of ten children.
  • At 12, she assisted her father in calculating the exact moment of a solar eclipse.
  • She never married and had no children.
  • When she found out that she and the only other female professor at Vassar college earned less money from the younger male professors, she insisted on getting a raise – and got it.
  • She addressed the Association for the Advancement of Women’s First Women’s Congress in a speech titled The Higher Education of Women.
  • In 1869, at age 51, she became one of the first women to join the American Philosophical Society.
  • She edited the astronomical column of Scientific American.
  • She refused to wear clothes made of Southern cotton.
  • In 1896, her sister published a collection of her writings called – Maria Mitchell: Life, Letters, and Journals.
  • Her telescope is preserved by the Smithsonian Institution National Museum of American History.
  • In 1906, three of her students were named in the first list of Academic Men of Science: Antonia Maury, Professor Mary Whitney, and Dr. Christine Ladd Franklin.
  • Her bust is on display at the Hall of Fame for Great Americans in NYC.
  • In 2013, on her 195 birthday, Google honored her with a Google Doodle.
  • The Maria Mitchell Association in Nantucket is named in her honor.
  • The WW2 ship SS Maria Mitchell is named in her honor.
  • The New York’s Metro-North commuter railroad has a train named the Maria Mitchell Comet.
  • The lunar crater Mitchell is named in her honor.

Awards

  • A gold medal prize for her discovery by King Christian VIII of Denmark (1848)
  • Inducted into the National Women's Hall of Fame (1994)
  • Honorary degrees from Columbia University, Hanover College, and Rutgers Female College

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Category: Science & Technology
Tags: Educator and Scientist

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Activism & Feminism

Adelina Otero-Warren, 1881-1965

A suffrage leader, educator, and politician. The first Latina to run for US Congress and one of the first’s women to serve as a government official in New Mexico.

Adelina “Nina” Otero Warren was born near Los Lunas, New Mexico. Her family was among the early settlers in New Mexico, and her parents were part of the Hispanic elite. When she was 2 years old, her father was killed by an Anglo squatter. A few years later, her mother married an English businessman, and she grew up in a multicultural environment. She was influenced by her mother, who was an advocate for social and educational developments and served as the director of Santa Fe’s Board of Education. At 16, the family relocated to Santa Fe, where she became a socialite. At the age of 26, she married Lieutenant Rawson D. Warren, a cavalry officer who was nine years older than her. Though the marriage did not last long, she kept her x-husband’s last name and called herself a widow, so she would not be stigmatized as a divorced woman.   At 31, Nina moved to NYC to keep house for her brother. There, she became active in Anne Morgan’s settlement house, working alongside the famous suffragist Alice Paul and organizing crafts programs for working-class women. Two years later, her mother died, and Nina returned to Santa Fe to take care of her half-siblings. Upon her arrival, she started working for the Congressional Union for Woman Suffrage. Soon she became the first Mexican-American state leader of the Congressional Union in New Mexico, raising support from the Spanish-speaking community as well as from the English-speaking community. Using her family connections, she was a successful lobbyist for voting in favor of the Nineteenth Amendment, and she had a key role in its ratification in 1920. In 1922, at the age of 41, Nina ran as the Republican Party nominee for New Mexico to the US House of Representatives – The first Latina to run for the US Congress. During her campaign, she spoke Spanish and advocated for the improvement of education, health care, and welfare services, as well as for the preservation of Hispano heritage and culture. Ultimately, she lost the election by less than 9%, probably because it was discovered that she was a divorcee, not a widow. In 1917 Nina was appointed as the Santa Fe Superintendent of Instruction – one of the first women to serve as government officials in New Mexico. In her 12 years in office, she worked tirelessly to improve the education of Hispano. This post is also available in: Español Read more...
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An award-winning American poet, essayist, and feminist thought influencer, who was called “one of the most widely read and influential poets of the second half of the 20th century.”

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. This post is also available in: Español Read more...
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Politics & Leaders

Agnes Macphail, 1890-1954

A Canadian politician. The first woman elected to the House of Commons of Canada.

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Alice Dunbar Nelson, 1875-1935

A poet, journalist, playwright, and political activist. Associated with the Harlem Renaissance of the 1920s.

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