Category: Activism & Social Change

Image description: A black-and-white portrait-style photo of Belle Case La Follette.

Belle Case La Follette

Belle Case La Follette was the first woman to graduate from law school in Wisconsin and an outspoken advocate for women's right to vote.
Image description: A black-and-white portrait-style photo of Ada James with faded edges.

Ada James

Ada James was a Wisconsin suffragist leader who worked for women’s rights and other reforms in the early 20th century.
Image description: A black-and-white portrait-style photo of Jessie Jack Hooper.

Jessie Jack Hooper

Jessie Jack Hooper, a suffragist, was president of the Wisconsin League of Women Voters and also ran for the U.S. Senate in 1922.
A photo of bell hooks speaking into a microphone.

bell hooks

Best known for her work on gender, race, and class, University of Wisconsin graduate bell hooks was a prolific writer, speaker, and scholar.
Image description: A black-and-white headshot of Anita Herrera.

Anita Herrera

Anita Herrera grew up in a family of migrant farm workers and devoted her career to improving education, employment, and living conditions for People of Color in Wisconsin.
Image description: A black-and-white photo of Mildred Fish-Harnack standing outside and gazing above her.

Mildred Fish-Harnack

Mildred Fish-Harnack was the only American woman to die by Adolf Hitler's direct order for spying on Germany during World War II.
Image description: A headshot of Sarah Harder.

Sarah Harder

Sarah Harder started the women's studies program at the University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire and built many women's coalitions in Wisconsin and nationally.
Image description: A black-and-white photo of Lorraine Hansberry holding a pencil with her right hand and using her left to lean on a desk.

Lorraine Hansberry

Lorraine Hansberry's first Broadway play, A Raisin in the Sun, changed how Black people's lives were shown in American theater.
Image description: A photo of Ann D. Gordon speaking into a megaphone.

Ann D. Gordon

A student activist in the 1960s, Ann D. Gordon became a history professor and an important scholar of women’s suffrage in the U.S.
Image description: A headshot of Debora Gil Casado.

Debora Gil Casado

Community activist and educator Debora Gil R. Casado cofounded the first Spanish-language immersion school in Madison, Wisconsin.