Wangarĩ Muta Maathai was born in the village of Ihithe, Kenya. At 11, she was sent to a boarding school at the Mathari Catholic Mission in Nyeri, where she learned English and converted to Catholicism. At 16, after graduating top of her class, she was granted admission to Loreto High School, a Catholic high school for girls. In 1960, 20 years old Maathai was one of the 300 Kenyans selected to study in the US as part of the Kennedy Airlift and studied biology, chemistry, and German at Mount St. Scholastica College in Atchison, Kansas. After receiving an MSc in biological sciences from the University of Pittsburgh, she worked as a research assistant in the microanatomy section Department of Veterinary Anatomy in the School of Veterinary Medicine at the University College of Nairobi. Later, she moved to Germany to write her doctorate, completing it at the University of Nairobi while serving as an assistant lecturer. In 1971, at 31, Maathai became the first Eastern African woman to receive a Ph.D. from the University of Nairobi. In the early 1970s, Maathai became an active member of various civic organizations. She held positions such as director of the Nairobi branch of the Kenya Red Cross Society and board chair of the Environment Liaison Centre. She also continued her academic career, and in 1976, at 36, she was appointed chair of the Department of Veterinary Anatomy and associate professor the following year, becoming the first woman to serve in these positions. At the time, she began to work with the National Council of Women of Kenya, formulating a strategy to involve women in rural areas in environmental conservation by planting trees. This initiative aimed to address the challenges of deforestation and desertification while providing a sustainable fuel source for communities. In 1977, she founded The Green Belt Movement, which in 1986 led to the founding of the Pan African Green Belt Network. Since its inception, the organization has planted approximately 40 million trees in Africa. Following their successes, many African countries, such as Tanzania, Uganda, Malawi, Lesotho, Ethiopia, and Zimbabwe, have adopted tree-planting initiatives to act against deforestation and promote environmental sustainability. Besides environmental conservation, Maathai advocated for other social causes, including human rights, AIDS prevention, and women’s issues, representing these concerns in United Nations General Assembly meetings. In 2002, at 62, Maathai was elected as the representative of the Tetu constituency in Kenya’s parliament, and a year later was appointed Assistant Minister for Environment and Natural Resources, serving in both positions until 2007. In 2004, Maathai won the Nobel Peace Prize for her “holistic approach to sustainable development that embraces democracy, human rights, and women’s rights in particular,” becoming the first Black African woman winner. She continued campaigning for environmental causes and human rights, becoming the first president of the African Union’s Economic, Social and Cultural Council and as a Goodwill Ambassador to the Congo Basin Forest Ecosystem. In 2006, together with five other sister Nobel Peace winners, she founded the Nobel Women’s Initiative to unite and support global efforts for women’s rights, fostering peace, justice, and equality. Maathai died of ovarian cancer at the age of 71. Read more...

Born Gerty Theresa Radnitz into a Jewish family in Prague, then part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. She received her primary education at home and later attended an academy for girls, graduating at 16. Inspiring to become a doctor, she completed a year of the necessary studies required for the medical school’s application, including Latin, physics, chemistry, and mathematics. In 1914, at 18, she began her studies at the medical school of the Karl-Ferdinands-Universität in Prague. During school, she met fellow medical student Carl Cori, and they married right after receiving their degree in 1920. Afterward, they moved to Vienna, where she worked at the Carolinen Children’s Hospital, conducting experiments in temperature regulation and publishing papers on blood disorders. Health problems caused by malnutrition during WW1 and the increasing anti-Semitism drove the Coris to leave Europe, and in 1922, they immigrated to the US. They worked together at the Roswell Park Cancer Institute in Buffalo, New York, focusing on carbohydrate metabolism, researching the glucose metabolizing in the body and how hormones regulate the process. The couple published fifty papers on the subject, eleven with Cori as the sole author. In 1929, the Coris introduced the Cori cycle, which describes the cellular process in which the body stores sugar in muscles as glycogen, converts it to glucose in the liver, and sends it back to the muscles for energy. Although the Coris were equal in their work, they were not treated as such, and she experienced much chauvinism and prejudice. When the couple looked for an institute that would enable them to work together, they were refused because of Cori’s gender or because, as one university stated, it is “un-American for a married couple to work together.” Eventually, in 1931, the Coris received an offer from Washington University in St. Louis, Missouri. Although they could collaborate, she was offered a research associate position at one-tenth of her husband’s salary. It took 13 years before she was appointed associate professor of Research Biological Chemistry and Pharmacology and four more years to be promoted to full professor, serving in this position until she died. While at Washington University, the Coris continued to research the action mechanism of hormones and discovered what would be known as the Cori ester – a compound in frog muscles that helps to break down glycogen. They also found the enzyme that created the compound and identified that it’s the first step in turning stored energy (glycogen) into glucose. In addition, Cori researched glycogen storage disease by herself and identified several forms related to enzymatic defects. She was the first to present how these defects can cause human genetic disorders. In 1947, for their discovery of the Cori cycle, the Coris won the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine; she became the first woman to win the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine, the first American woman, and the third in the world to win a Nobel Prize in Science. Months before winning the Nobel prize, Cori was diagnosed with myelosclerosis, a bone marrow disease. With declining health, she continued researching and discovering new enzymes and their relations to various health problems. She was also a member of several societies, including the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, the National Academy of Sciences, the American Philosophical Society, and the American Society of Biological Chemists. She died at 61. Read more...

Malala Yousafzai was born in Swat Valley, Pakistan, to a Sunni Muslim family of Pashtun ethnicity. Her father is a poet, school owner, and educational activist. He was her first teacher and educator, inspiring her curiosity and activism. In 2008, when Yousafzai was 11 years old, Taliban militants took over Swat Valley, enforcing strict Islamic law, banning music and television, forbidding women from going shopping, and preventing girls’ education by destroying and shutting down girls’ schools. In protest of the school closings, her father took her to a press club in Peshawar, where she gave her first public speech titled “How Dare the Taliban Take Away My Basic Right to Education?” In January 2009, following the shutdown of all the girls’ schools, Yousafzai began writing a blog for BBC Urdu. For three months, using the pseudonym name Gul Makai, she wrote 35 entries where she shared her experiences under the Taliban regime. During this period, 12 years old Yousafzai was interviewed for a Pakistani talk show, making her first TV appearance. After a short cease-fire, in which the Taliban allowed girls to attend school as long as they wore burkas, the Pakistani Army entered the region to gain control. For her safety, she was sent to live with relatives until the Taliban’s defeat. A few months earlier, a New York Times reporter made a short documentary about Yousafzai and her school shutdown. After the documentary aired, Yousafzai was interviewed in various newspapers and TV shows, both in Pakistan and abroad, using the platform to advocate for women’s education. Receiving the media attention, it became apparent that Yousafzai is the BBC’s blogger, and she gained recognition for her activism, was appointed chair of the District Child Assembly of the Khpal Kor Foundation, and was awarded Pakistan’s first National Youth Peace Prize. In 2011, at the age of 14, Yousafzai joined the Aware Girls, a local girls’ empowerment organization training its participants to oppose radicalization peacefully through education. With her growing familiarity, Yousafzai received death threats through social media and in newspapers that slipped under the door of her home. On October 9th, 2012, while on her way home from school, a masked gunman went on her bus and shouted “Which one of you is Malala?” and shot her in the face. The bullet traveled 18 inches from the side of her left eye, through her neck to the shoulder. Yousafzai survived the attack, suffering from damage in a nerve that paralyzed the left side of her face. Yousafzai’s attack caused an international protest and a call for action. UN Special Envoy for Global Education, Gordon Brown, introduced a petition in Yousafzai’s name, demanding that till 2015 no child be left out of school. The petition led to the ratification of the first Right to Education Bill in Pakistan. In 2012, the Pakistani President launched a $10 million education fund in Yousafzai’s honor, and the Vital Voices Global Partnership founded the Malala Fund to support girls’ education worldwide. Three months after her attack, Yousafzai was released from the hospital, continuing her rehabilitation at her new home in Birmingham. There, she attended the all-girls Edgbaston High School while continuing her activism. On July 12th, 2013, on her 16th birthday, Yousafzai addressed the UN, making her first public appearance after being shot only nine months earlier. In her speech, she urged the world leaders to focus on women’s education rights. The UN named the event “Malala Day.” She met Queen Elizabeth II and President Barack Obama and co-authored a memoir called “I Am Malala: The Girl Who Stood Up for Education and Was Shot by the Taliban.” In 2014, Yousafzai received the Nobel Peace Prize, alongside Kailash Satyarthi, a children’s rights activist from India, becoming the youngest Nobel laureate at the age of 17. In the following year, at age 18, she opened a school in Lebanon for Syrian refugees. After graduating high school, Yousafzai studied Philosophy, Politics, and Economics at the University of Oxford, England, receiving her degree in 2020. She published two more books – a picture children’s book titled “Malala’s Magic Pencil” and a collection of experiences titled “We Are Displaced: True Stories of Refugee Lives.” Yousafzai continues advocating for women’s education and promoting human rights in various ways, including raising funds and establishing institutes and programs for this cause. Read more...

Maria Salomea Skłodowska Curie was born in Warsaw, Russia (Nowadays, Poland). Curie has always been a top student, graduating at 16 with a gold medal, but could not enroll in formal higher education institutions because of her gender. Instead, she studied at a secret school called “Flying University,” which admitted female students. Her family did not have the means to finance school abroad, especially after her mother died a few years earlier, so she and her older sister had an agreement to take turns in work to support the other’s education in Paris. As the younger, Curie worked as a home tutor to finance her sister while educating herself independently. In 1891, at the age of 24, she joined her sister in Paris, changing her name to Marie, and began to study physics, chemistry, and mathematics at the Sorbonne while continuing to tutor in the evenings. At 26, she earned her degree in physics, and in the following year, she received her second degree. She was commissioned to study different types of steel and their magnetic features but did not have a lab to do her work. While looking for a lab, she met the physicist Pierre Curie, who allowed her to use his lab for her research. Soon, they became involved romantically and got married within a year. In 1896, 29 years old Curie became fascinated with Henri Becquerel’s discovery of radioactivity and began researching substances that emit radiation. Her husband was so intrigued by her work that he left his own research and joined hers. Their lab was not big enough for their experiments, so they worked in an old shed with broken windows and no heat. In the following year, Curie had given birth to her first daughter Irène. In addition to the challenges of being a new mom and working on her research, she began to teach at the École Normale Supérieure to support her growing family. After two years of research, the Curies succeeded in isolating a new element, which they called Polonium, after Curie’s home country of Poland. Six months later, they announced the discovery of another element, Radium. Between 1898 to 1902, the couple published 32 papers on the new elements and their various properties, especially their therapeutic abilities. In 1900, at the age of 33, Curie was appointed lecturer in physics at the École Normale Supérieure, the first female faculty member at the school. There, she introduced an innovative teaching method based on experimental demonstrations. In 1903, she received her doctorate of science from the Sorbonne. At that same time, Curie, her husband, and Henri Becquerel were awarded the Nobel Prize in Physics for their researches on radiation, becoming the first woman to be awarded a Nobel Prize. In 1906, after the sudden death of her husband, Curie was offered her husband’s vacant professorship position at the Sorbonne, once again making history as the first woman to teach at the prestigious university. She continued her research, and in 1910 she succeeded in isolating Radium while defining a new standard for radioactive emissions, which she named the Curie after her and her husband. In recognition of her revolutionary work, Curie won the 1911 Nobel Prize in Chemistry, making her the first to win two Nobel Prizes and the first to be awarded the Nobel Prize in two scientific fields. Only after winning her second Nobel Prize, Curie become a member of the Conseil du Physique Solvay and got the French government support to establish the Radium Institute of the University of Paris, where she served as the director of the Curie Laboratory. In the first year of WW1, Curie developed mobile X-ray units, which were used for diagnosing injuries in field hospitals. Serving as Director of the Red Cross Radiological Service, Curie, and her 17 years old daughter, Irène, set up the first military radiology center in France and supplied 200 “Petits Curies” that helped locate fractures and bullets of the wounded men. In 1915, she provided the field hospitals with needles that contained Radium emanation from her supply, enabling sterilizing infected tissues. Later, she detailed her wartime experiences in the book Radiology in War. After the war, Curie continued with her research and teaching positions and gave lectures around the world. She served on the International Atomic Weights Committee and established the Curie Foundation in Paris and the Radium Institute in Warsaw, where her older sister served as director. Curie died at the age of 66 of aplastic anemia, which was caused by years of radiation exposure. Read more...

Stacey Abrams was born in Madison, Wisconsin, and grew up in Gulfport, Mississippi, and then Atlanta, Georgia. Growing up, her parents had struggled to stay above the poverty line, and more than once there could not pay the water and electricity bills. After graduating high school valedictorian, she studied interdisciplinary studies at Spelman College, earning her Bachelor of Arts with magna cum laude. During that time, she worked in the youth services department in Atlanta’s mayor’s office and later interned at the US Environmental Protection Agency. She continued her education at the University of Texas at Austin’s LBJ School of Public Affairs, earning a Master of Public Affairs degree, followed by a Juris Doctor degree from Yale Law School. At the age of 26, Abrams worked as a tax attorney at a law firm in Atlanta, and at 29, she was appointed a deputy city attorney for the City of Atlanta. In 2006, the 33 years old Abrams won the election as the 89th district representative at the Georgia House of Representatives. In her 11 years in office, she served on various committees, including Ethics, Appropriations, Ways & Means, and Judiciary Non-Civil. She promoted pro-choice and gun control policies and opposed strict voter ID laws. In 2010, she was elected as the House minority leader, becoming the first woman to lead a major party in the Georgia General Assembly and the first African-American to lead the Georgia House of Representatives. In this role, Abrams co-administrated the bipartisan transportation bill to save the HOPE scholarship program, stopping the largest tax increase in the state’s history. She also co-wrote a criminal-justice reform to reduce prison costs without increasing crime. During that time, she co-founded the financial services firm NOW Corp and Nourish, Inc – a beverage company. In 2017, Abrams resigned office to focus on her 2018 gubernatorial campaign. When she won the Democratic nomination, Abrams became the first African-American woman to be elected as a major party’s nominee for governor. She lost the general elections by only 55,000 votes. During her career, Abrams founded several organizations advocating for voting rights. In 2014 she established the New Georgia Project, in which she worked for registering voters who are unlikely to vote, especially people of color. In 2020, she founded Fair Fight to promote fair elections, ensuring that every citizen has a voice in the election system and encouraging voter participation by educating about voting rights. Abrams has been nominated for the 2021 Nobel Peace Prize for leading the nonviolent campaign for exercising voting rights. Abrams is serving on many boards and committees, including the Center for American Progress, the Democratic Legislative Campaign Committee, the Gateway Center for the Homeless, the Georgia Partnership for Excellence in Education, and Let America Vote. She is also a lifetime member of the Council on Foreign Relations. Read more...

The award-winning novelist published her first book when she was almost 40 years old. Her works revolve around the history of slavery and contemporary African-American experience.   Born Chloe Ardelia Wofford, she lived in six different homes during her childhood. She wanted to be a dancer, but as a teenager worked as a domestic. Morrison graduated from Howard University with a BA in English and later received a Master’s Degree from Cornell University. She was married for six years to architect Harold Morrison and had two sons, one of them died of cancer when he was in his forties. After the divorce, she managed a job as an editor in a publishing house, lecturing and being a single mother. She started working on her first novel in her late thirties, waking up at 4 AM to write before going to her day job.   Her first novel ‘The Bluest Eye’ was published in 1970, her second novel ‘Sula’ won thr Ohioana Book Award, and her third book ‘Song of Solomon’ won several prizes. Her greatest fame came with 1987 novel ‘Beloved’ which is based on the true story of Margaret Garner, who escaped slavery and killed her child to remain in freedom. The book received the Pulitzer Prize, was adapted into a movie starring Oprah Winfrey, and an opera.   Morrison went on to publish more than ten novels, write plays, co-author children’s books with her son, lecture, and curate an exhibition on migration at the Louvre Museum in Paris. In 1993 she became the first African-American woman to win the Nobel Prize for literature. Read more...

Born in Cedarville, Illinois. As a teen, inspired by reading Dickens and by her mother’s kindness to the poor, Addams had a dream to do good in the world and to become a doctor. After graduating from Rockford Female Seminary, she attended the Woman’s Medical College of Philadelphia but had to quit after one year due to health problems. After returning from a two years tour in Europe, Addams felt useless and unsure of her future and sank into depression. At the age of 27, accompanied by several friends, Addams traveled to London to visit the first settlement house, a non-class community house, where people live, earn an education and get health care. Two years later, Addams and her partner, Ellen Gates Starr, founded a settlement house in Chicago, called Hull House, which eventually became a research and education center, with activities and services. At its height, Hull House was the residence of about 25 women and was visited by 2,000 people on a weekly basis. In addition to her activities at Hull House, Addams worked with other reform groups to achieve social improvements, including factory inspection, an eight-hour working day for women, justice for immigrants and the black community, women’s suffrage, research on the causes of poverty and crime, and the establishment of the first juvenile-court law. At the age of 45, Addams began serving on Chicago’s Board of Education, and five years later she became the first female president of the National Conference of Social Work. As a pacifist and peace activist, during WW1 she lectured on peace and ending the war, served as chairman of the International Congress of Women, and later as the president of the Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom. In 1931, in recognition of her work, Addams was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize, the first American woman that won this prize. Read more...