Nazik al-Mala’ika, a ground-breaking Iraqi poet and women’s rights advocate, was one of the first Arab poets to work in free verse instead of the classical rhyme form.

Lorena "Hick" Hickok was a journalist during the U.S. Great Depression and a close friend of First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt.

Edna Ferber was a short story writer, playwright, and Pulitzer Prize–winning novelist who portrayed strong women characters.

Maud Neprud Otjen was the first woman in Wisconsin to be a county superintendent of schools and encouraged women to be involved in civic life.

Nellie Wilson spent her life fighting for employment opportunities for women and was the first African American woman to hold a leadership position in her local steelworkers union.

Helen C. White was the first woman to hold a full professorship in the College of Letters and Science at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

The first book in author Laura Ingalls Wilder’s popular LITTLE HOUSE series is about Wilder’s childhood in Wisconsin.

Ruth Harman Walraven was a trailblazing female pilot in the mid-20th century.

Trial lawyer Dorothy Walker was the first female district attorney in Wisconsin.

Emma Toft is known as “Wisconsin’s First Lady of Conservation” for her efforts to save an ancient forest in Door County from being destroyed by logging and commercial development.