Learn about women who have fought for equal justice under the law!
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In 1904, Mary McLeod Bethune began a school for poor African American children in Daytona, Florida. With only $1.50 to start the school, she had to be very creative. The desks were made from packing...
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At a time when there were few educational opportunities for African Americans, Mary McLeod Bethune created schools and a thriving college for them. Mary was born in Mayesville, South Carolina to freed...
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Ruby Bridges' first day at William Frantz Elementary School was very unusual. Integration, or the sharing of schools by African American and white people, had recently become law in 1960. She was one...
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In a Palmetto Voices exclusive for Ready to Vote, Jennet Alterman, women's rights activist and former Executive Director of the Charleston Center for Women, explains why it is so important for women...
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Susan Pringle Frost dedicated her life to making sure that Charleston’s historic architectural beauty would be preserved. Born in Charleston to wealthy parents in 1873, she lived in the Miles Brewton...
Interactive
View female civil rights activists from South Carolina and in the United States from the 1930s to the 1960s on the interactive civil rights timeline.
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Best known for her fierce stance on behalf of civil rights in South Carolina, the successful businesswoman served as NAACP State Secretary during the 1950s. The Columbia native Mrs. Simkins was...
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Eleven months after the murder of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., the eyes of the nation focused on Charleston, South Carolina, where a conflict developed over striking workers. On March 20, 1969 Mrs...
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Illustration by Maria Manhattan Lorraine Hansberry was born on May 19, 1930 and grew up in Chicago, Illinois—the daughter of a real estate broker when segregation and restrictive covenants meant that...
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Rita Dove 1952 - In 1987, Rita Dove was one of the youngest poets to win a Pulitzer Prize for poetry. Dove also became the youngest poet laureate of the United States in 1993. Currently, Dove is a...