Ammonite: the remarkable real science of Mary Anning and her fossils
Reading time: 6 minutes
Palaeontologist Mary Anning is known for discovering a multitude of Jurassic fossils from Lyme Regis on England’s Dorset Coast from the age of ten in 1809.
Her discoveries included the first complete Icthyosaurus (although it was her little brother who first stumbled across the skull, Anning spent the next year excavating and preparing the rest of the fossil), the first complete Plesiosaurus and subsequent plesiosaur species, a perfectly preserved belemnite complete with anterior sheath and inkbag, and the first pterodactyl Dimorphodon.
Hidden women of history: Maria Sibylla Merian, 17th-century entomologist and scientific adventurer
Reading time: 8 minutes
Most school kids can describe in detail the life cycle of butterflies: eggs hatch into caterpillars, caterpillars turn into cocoons and cocoons hatch. This seemingly basic bit of biology was once hotly debated. It was a pioneering naturalist, Maria Sibylla Merian, whose meticulous observations conclusively linked caterpillars to butterflies, laying the groundwork for the fields of entomology, animal behaviour and ecology.
Women in the Second World War: Military service in East Africa
Reading time: 8 minutes
Hundreds of women served with the British Army in East Africa, and their role in the conflict goes largely untold.
Australian politics explainer: how women gained the right to vote
Reading time: 5 minutes
Between 1894 and 1908 a wave of women’s enfranchisement swept across Australia. Beginning in South Australia in 1894 and ending 14 years later in Victoria, Australia’s six colonies allowed women to vote.
The Woman King is more than an action movie – it shines a light on the women warriors of Benin
Reading time: 6 minutes
The Woman King is a big-budget Hollywood movie that has been anticipated since 2018, when US star Viola Davis was announced as the lead in the story of the “amazons” of Dahomey. Rising South African star Thuso Mbedu also takes a key role in the film, which has premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival and is heading to cinemas worldwide.
Women in the Second World War: The Palestinian Auxiliary Territorial Service
Reading time: 8 minutes
As the women’s branch of the British Army during the Second World War, the Auxiliary Territorial Service (ATS) was formed in 1938. Women serving in the ATS were tasked with the ultimate aim of ‘freeing up’ men for combatant roles on the front line.
Women in the Second World War: The sinking of SS Khedive Ismail
Reading time: 7 minutes
On the afternoon of 12 February 1944, travelling in a convoy from Mombasa to Ceylon (modern-day Sri Lanka), troopship SS Khedive Ismail was struck by two Japanese torpedoes just south-west of the Maldives. Hit directly in the vicinity of its engine and boiler rooms, the ship sank within just two minutes of the attack. Of the 1,506 passengers and crew on board, mostly military personnel, there were little more than 200 survivors.
On the money: Kate Sheppard and the making of a New Zealand feminist icon
Reading time: 7 minutes
In 1992 four New Zealand icons (and the queen) appeared on new banknotes. Part of creating national identity, these notable citizens were chosen to represent the pinnacles of achievement.
How the Australian Women’s Weekly spoke to ‘50s housewives about the Cold War
Reading time: 5 minutes
Esmé Fenston, by the end of the 1950s, the Australian Women’s Weekly was selling over 805,000 copies a week. More than half of all Australian women read the magazine.
The Suffragette: The History of the Women’s Militant Suffrage Movement
THE SUFFRAGETTE: THE HISTORY OF THE WOMEN’S MILITANT SUFFRAGE MOVEMENT By E. Sylvia Pankhurst (1882 – 1960) This history of the Women’s Suffrage agitation is written at a time when the question is in the very forefront of British politics. What the immediate future holds for those women who are most actively engaged in fighting for […]
Susan B. Anthony Rebel, Crusader, Humanitarian – Audiobook
SUSAN B. ANTHONY REBEL, CRUSADER, HUMANITARIAN – AUDIOBOOK By Alma Lutz (1890 – 1973) Alma Lutz’s outstanding biography of Susan B. Anthony is revered for its descriptive power, attention to detail and historical significance to the women’s Suffragette movement.
5 Inspiring Women Of History
5 INSPIRING WOMEN OF HISTORY Throughout history, the world has witnessed influential women take the world by storm. Many have been pioneers for women’s rights, paving the way for future women to make their marks. Some made waves in the fight for racial equality, others made significant changes in positions of power not typically afforded […]
Enheduanna, princess, priestess and the world’s first known author
ENHEDUANNA, PRINCESS, PRIESTESS AND THE WORLD’S FIRST KNOWN AUTHOR The world’s first known author is widely considered to be Enheduanna, a woman who lived in the 23rd century BCE in ancient Mesopotamia (approximately 2285 – 2250 BCE). Enheduanna is a remarkable figure: an ancient “triple threat”, she was a princess and a priestess as well as […]
Australia’s first known female voter, the famous Mrs Fanny Finch
AUSTRALIA’S FIRST KNOWN FEMALE VOTER, THE FAMOUS MRS FANNY FINCH On 22 January 1856, an extraordinary event in Australia’s history occurred. It is not part of our collective national identity, nor has it been mythologised over the decades through song, dance, or poetry. It doesn’t even have a hashtag. But on this day in the […]
The Life of Clara Barton – Volume 1 – Audiobook
THE LIFE OF CLARA BARTON – VOLUME 1 – AUDIOBOOK By William E. Barton (1861 – 1930) Clarissa Harlowe Barton (December 25, 1821 – April 12, 1912) was a pioneering American nurse who founded the American Red Cross. She was a hospital nurse in the American Civil War, a teacher, and a patent clerk. Since nursing […]
The Life of Clara Barton – Volume 2 – Audiobook
THE LIFE OF CLARA BARTON – VOLUME 2 – AUDIOBOOK By William E. Barton (1861 – 1930) Clarissa Harlowe Barton (December 25, 1821 – April 12, 1912) was a pioneering American nurse who founded the American Red Cross. She was a hospital nurse in the American Civil War, a teacher, and a patent clerk. Since nursing […]
Women of America – AudioBook
WOMEN OF AMERICA – AUDIOBOOK By John Ruse Larus (1858 – 1920) The present volume completes the story of woman as told in the series of which it forms part. The history of nations is, in its ultimate analysis, largely that of woman. Therefore this series in its wide inclusiveness forms a more than ordinarily interesting […]
Sardines for breakfast, hypothermia rescues: the story of the cash-strapped, post-pandemic 1920 Olympics
Since the global pandemic began, debate has raged over whether Tokyo should go ahead with the Olympic Games, now set to open on July 23. The same heated debates were heard the last time an Olympic Games were staged following a global pandemic — the 1920 Summer Olympics in Antwerp. The International Olympic Committee (IOC) […]
How do archaeologists know where to dig?
National Geographic magazines and Indiana Jones movies might have you picturing archaeologists excavating near Egyptian pyramids, Stonehenge and Machu Picchu. And some of us do work at these famous places. But archaeologists like us want to learn about how people from the past lived all over the planet. We rely on left-behind artifacts to help fill out that […]
How Eleanor Roosevelt reshaped the role of First Lady and became a feminist icon
“Well-behaved women seldom make history” is a phrase frequently trotted out around International Women’s Day, and just as frequently attributed to Eleanor Roosevelt. It doesn’t matter that the former First Lady of the United States never actually said this – in fact, it was Pulitzer Prize-winning historian Laurel Thatcher Ulrich in an obscure academic article in the […]
The Siege of Haarlem, Kenau, and Creating a Heroine
The Dutch Revolt, the conflict that created an independent Netherlands free from Spain, also created a lot of legends around events and people, placing them firmly in the shared consciousness. One of the more interesting of these people is Kenau Simonsdochter Hasselaar, a woman who played an important part in the ultimately failed defence of […]
The Reality of Joan of Arc
Last spring, I found myself in the surprising position of explaining to a student sitting in my office that Joan of Arc was real. At the small liberal arts college where I teach, Hollywood History is an intermediate course without prerequisites that fulfills a general education requirement. Unlike the upper-level medieval history elective, it fills […]
Caste: A Divisive Structure in the United States, India, and Nazi Germany
In her new book, Caste: The Origins of Our Discontents, Isabel Wilkerson writes that the ways in which we are divided today are “like the wind, powerful enough to knock you down but invisible as they go about their work.” Wilkerson unveils parallels between the modern United States’ divisions and the way similarly divisive systems […]
‘I want to scream and scream’: Australian nurses on the Western Front were also victims of war
The revival of interest in Anzac since the 1980s has depended in part on the repositioning of soldiers as victims. We rarely celebrate their martial virtues, and instead note their resilience, fortitude and suffering. This shift in emphasis opens up more promising space for the inclusion of women. Nurses were not warriors – they were […]