ODU Women's Center

May 26, 1951:  Sally Ride, astrophysicist, first American woman astronaut

May 21, 1973:  Lynn Genesko, a swimmer, received the first athletic scholarship awarded to a woman (University of Miami).

MAY 21, 1932:  Amelia Earhart Putnam is 1st woman to complete a solo transatlantic flight.  She flew from Newfoundland to Ireland, a 2,026-mile trip, in just under 15 hours.

MAY 11, 1875:  Harriet Quimby, first American woman licensed air pilot (1911), first woman to fly across the English Channel (1912).

MAY 11, 1894:  Martha Graham, modern dance innovator and choreographer

MAY 11, 1906:  Lt. Ethel Weed, military officer in the Women’s Army Corp; promoted Women’s rights and suffrage in Japan.

MAY 10, 1872:  Victoria Woodhull is nominated as the first woman candidate for U.S. President of the Equal Rights Party.

MAY 8, 1914:  President Woodrow Willson signs a Proclamation designating the second Sunday in May as Mother’s Day.  On May 9, 1914 it became an official public holiday. 

MAY 3, 1979:  Margaret Thatcher became the first woman elected prime minister of England.

MAY 3, 1937:  Margaret Mitchell won the Pultizer Prize in fiction forGone With the Wind. She also won the National Book Award and Most Distinguished Novel of 1936 for the book as well.