Science
For her groundbreaking work in physics, she was the first woman ever to win a Nobel Prize , and with her later win in Chemistry, she became the first person to claim a Nobel Prize twice, and the only person to win a Nobel Prize in two different scientific fields.
MARIE CURIE
She is a multi-media artist who uses colorful abstract paintings, quilts, mixed media sculptures, and children's books to address issues like feminism and politics. Depicting narrative scenes, these images represent her beliefs with inspiration from past and present historical beliefs.
FAITH RINGGOLD
She is an English writer whose novels, through their nonlinear approaches to narrative, exerted a major influence on the modernist genre. Some of her best known novels include Mrs. Dalloway (1925) and To The Lighthouse (1927).
VIRGINIA WOOLF
She is an American professional tennis player who has held the top spot in the Women’s Tennis Association (WTA) rankings numerous times over her stellar career. With 23 Grand Slam Titles, she is often regarded as the greatest women's tennis player, and perhaps the greatest athlete of all time.
SERENA WILLIAMS
She is one of the most popular female artists of the 21st century. A 15x Grammy winner, she originally debuted as a country artist, but later reformulated her image as a pop icon.
TAYLOR SWIFT
She conducted research that would go on to prove the double-helix structure of DNA. Sadly, her work was stolen and accredited to scientists James D. Watson and Francis Crick.
ROSALIND FRANKLIN
She is considered one of Mexico's greatest artists who began painting mostly self-portraits after she was severely injured in a bus accident.
FRIDA KAHLO
She was a pioneer in the field of literature with famous depictions of British society in the 19th century. Her most famous novels are Pride and Prejudice (1813) and Emma (1816).
JANE AUSTEN
With 11 Olympic medals and 30 World Championship medals, she is the most decorated gymnast in history. She is also widely regarded as one of the greatest gymnasts of all time, and one of the greatest female athletes of all time.
SIMONE BILES
Sometimes referred to as the "First Lady of Song" and "Queen of Jazz", this singer was noted for her purity of tone, impeccable diction, phrasing, timing, intonation, and a "horn-like" improvisational ability, particularly in her scat singing. At the very first Grammy Awards show, she became the first African-American woman to win, and would go on to win 13 more.
ELLA FITZGERALD
She became the first African-American woman to travel into space when she served as a mission specialist aboard the Space Shuttle Endeavour in 1992.
Mae Jemison
This artist uses large, stark black paper-cut silhouettes and drawings to portray the brutality of slavery. She is also a sculptor; one of her works, made entirely of sugar at the Domino Sugar Factory in Brooklyn, New York, depicts a Black woman as a sphinx and is considered one of her most important works.
KARA WALKER
This author is best known for her groundbreaking evocation of Mexican-American life in Chicago, Illinois, particularly in her 1983 novella The House on Mango Street. Many of her works have been published as bilingual editions.
SANDRA CISNEROS
Known for her exceptional scoring ability and play-making skills, she gained national attention within the NCAA for her impressive performances while playing for the University of Iowa. Regarded as one of the greatest female collegiate players, she is credited for helping popularize women's basketball and is now a professional WNBA player for the Indiana Fever.
CAITLIN CLARK
She is a singer and songwriter known as the "Queen of Soul". She captivated audiences with her powerful voice and emotive performances and is best known for her 1967 rendition of "Respect". She was twice named by Rolling Stone as the greatest singer of all time.
ARETHA FRANKLIN
She was an English writer who became the world's first computer programmer after she wrote the first algorithm that was meant to be processed by a machine.
ADA LOVELACE
One of the most celebrated women artists of the Abstract Expressionist movement, her large-scale works are known for their bold color and emotional intensity.
JOAN MITCHELL
In 1982, she became the first African-American woman to win the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction for her epistolary novel, The Color Purple. Over the span of her career, she has published 17 novels and short story collections, 12 non-fiction works, and collections of poetry and essays.
ALICE WALKER
This figure skater is the first U.S. American woman to win an individual medal in the Winter Olympics since 2006, as well as the first gold medalist since 2002. An accomplished jumper, she is also the first woman to complete a quadruple jump and triple Axel in the same program, and the first to land a triple Axel-triple toe loop combination in the short program.
ALYSA LIU
This singer, originally hailing from Cuba, began her career as the lead singer of the Miami Sound Machine, which produced cart-topping songs like "Conga", "Get On Your Feet", "Turn the Beat Around", and "Rhythm is Going to Get You" in the 1980s.
GLORIA ESTEFAN
She was a mathematician whose calculations of orbital mechanics were critical to the first U.S. crewed space flights. She is most well known as one of the first Black women to work as a NASA scientist.
KATHERINE JOHNSON
Often referred to as the "Mother of American Modernism," she is celebrated for her iconic large-scale flower paintings and striking landscapes of the US American Southwest.
GEORGIA O'KEEFFE
Best known for her groundbreaking novel Frankenstein, she is often regarded as a pioneer of the science fiction genre. Her works often argue that cooperation and sympathy, particularly as practiced by women in the family, were the ways to reform civil society.
MARY SHELLEY
She is a former world no. 1 tennis player who won 39 major singles and doubles titles. She is also a significant figure in the fight for gender equality within sports.
BILLIE JEAN KING
This actress won a Tony Award for her performance as Kim in the original Broadway production of Miss Saigon in 1991, marking the first time an Asian actress won a Tony. She is also best known for providing the singing voices of several Disney Princesses.
LEA SALONGA