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Leading Ladies: The Women of Maryland

Students of all ages can relate as sixth grade Sarah stresses over another impossible school project, and Mom (and Aunt Rose’s attic) come to the rescue. Along the way, they rediscover stories of women who shaped Maryland history in ways we’ll never forget. This quick tour through over 300 years of Maryland History is fun and educational and a great introduction to the history of the Freestate.

Women introduced by writers Julie Kurzava and Kristin Barnes include:

Margaret Brent (1601-1671) – The first woman in the New World to ask for the right to vote, in 1642. A property owner who helped found the new Maryland colony. She told the Maryland General Assembly “Taxation without representation is tyranny”.

Mary Katherine Goddard (1738-1816) – Founder, editor and publisher of the Maryland Journal in Baltimore City. The first person in the colonies to publish the Declaration of Independence, with the treasonous signatures attached.

Mary Pickersgill (1776-1857) – A seamstress and working single mother in Baltimore who sewed the flag that flew over Ft. McHenry during the 1814 Battle of Baltimore during the War of 1812. This flag inspired Francis Scott Keye’s poem “The Star Spangled Banner”.

Barbara Fritchie (1769-1865?) – A 95 year old woman in Frederick who refused to hide her Union flag during the Civil War, despite the danger from Stonewall Jackson’s troops. She was immortalized in a poem by John Greenleaf Whittier “The Ballad of Barbara Fritchie”.

Anna Ella Carroll (1815-1894) – A political regular who helped President Lincoln win the Civil War by spying on confederate troops on the Western front.

Mary Elizabeth Garrett (1854-1915) – The B&O Railroad heiress who endowed the Johns Hopkins Medical School in 1889, with the stipulation that the school become the first medical school in the country to admit women.

Edith Houghton Hooker (1879-1948) & Elizabeth King Ellicott (1858-1914) – Suffragettes and leaders of the Maryland Suffrage party during the early 1900’s. Hooker published the Maryland Suffrage News out of her home on Charles Street in Baltimore.

Claribel (1864-1929) & Etta Cone (1870-1949) – Two sisters who lived on Baltimore’s high-brow Eutaw Street who amassed one of the greatest collection of modern art in the world.

Rosey the Riveter – A catch all name for millions of hard working American women who helped win WWII here on the home front.

Rachel Carson (1907-1964) – a writer and scientist whose ground breaking book Silent Spring helped start the modern environmental movement.