National Women's History Alliance

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National Women's History Alliance

The folks who brought you Women's History Month! The NWHA is an educational nonprofit organization dedicated to Writing Women Back into History.

Promoting the importance of education, equality & inclusion. Follow us on Instagram, Linked In & Twitter! The National Women's History Alliance successfully lobbied Congress in 1987 to establish March as National Women's History Month. Our Mission: Writing Women Back into History! Education & event resources available on our website. Read our blog: http://www.nwha1980.org

Donate to help support our cause here!: https://national-womens-history-alliance.mybigcommerce.com/donation-nwha-membership/

08/24/2026

Who is Amalia Mesa-Bains?

Amalia Mesa-Bains, born on July 10, 1943, is a pioneering Chicana artist, activist, and scholar whose work blends installation, altar-making traditions, and feminist scholarship. Her art centers memory, identity, and ancestral storytelling, offering powerful reflections on the experiences of Mexican-American women and the importance of cultural reclamation.

To learn more about women's history, go to the National Women's History Alliance at https://nationalwomenshistoryalliance.org !

Picture Credits: Smithsonian American Women’s History Museum & Rena Bransten Gallery

08/23/2026

SAVE THE DATE!

On August 25th, 2026, at 4PM PST (6PM CT, 7PM EST), join historian and author Amanda Owen, author of The Justice Bell: Tracing the Journey of a Forgotten Symbol, for an exploration of how suffragists used a Liberty Bell replica as a dramatic, attention-getting symbol in their fight for the vote. Owen will share how she discovered the forgotten story of the Justice Bell and what its history reveals about the ways women’s stories can disappear from our collective memory, and how we can bring them back.

The webinar will also explore the lasting impact of the 19th Amendment and what its legacy means for women and democracy today.

Registration is free, but advance registration is required.

RESERVE YOUR SPOT : https://zoom.us/meeting/register/JEWQAyQOR_-8boynpu3vpQ #/registration

Can’t attend live?
Register and we’ll send you a link to the recording of the session afterward.

08/14/2026

Who was Margaret Angela Haley?

Margaret Angela Haley, born November 15th 1861, was an American educator and key union organizer for Chicago public school teachers. After teaching in schools across the city, she became a pioneering member and a district vice president of the Chicago Teacher’s Federation. Haley later also became president of the National Federation of Teachers, a role in which she lobbied to make the college-administrator dominated, larger and more important National Education Association respond to the needs of grade school staff. Over the course of her life, she championed salary increases, a state pension plan, and tenure laws for teachers. Haley also used her organization to support woman’s suffrage, child labour reforms and American democracy more widely.

To learn more about women's history, go to the National Women's History Alliance at https://nationalwomenshistoryalliance.org !

Picture Credits: Chicago History Museum

08/13/2026

Happy Birthday, Leonora Barry!

Leonora Barry, born August 13th 1849, was an Irish-American labour investigator and activist. Born in County Cork, Ireland, she emigrated with her family as a child. After being widowed and left with a young family to support, Barry worked as a seamstress and in a hosiery mill, and it was this experience with bad conditions and poor pay which inspired her to join the Knights of Labor.

She was a key figure in the organization’s establishment of a Women’s Department of Work, where she collected data from cities across the United States and lobbied to help women in the unskilled industrial workforce. As the first woman paid to be a labor investigator, her research increased awareness about the harsh work environments faced by women and children.

Her work led to the first factory inspection act in Pennsylvania in 1889. Barry continued her social advocacy work after resigning from the Knights, championing temperance and women’s suffrage.

To learn more about women's history, go to the National Women's History Alliance at https://nationalwomenshistoryalliance.org !

Picture Credits: The Catholic University of America

08/12/2026

This summer, pick a new book to enjoy!

The story of women’s great quest for democracy is told in a compelling way with more than 960 historical photographs and original documents that bring the grassroots movement alive in “Winning the Vote: The Triumph of the American Woman Suffrage Movement,” by Robert P. J. Cooney, Jr. .

This book reflects 12 years of work, the advice of experts in the field, and rarely seen visual material from throughout the country. This independently produced, 496-page book was named one of the “Five Best Books” on the subject and has been lauded by curators as ”the Bible of the suffrage movement.”

Order through the National Women’s History Alliance: https://lnkd.in/en9fhEcf or contact [email protected].

A deluxe Special Edition is also available for display, presentations and special collections, limited to 100 signed and numbered copies, bound in purple silk cloth and housed in a matching, gold-embossed slipcase with an exclusive opening photographic essay. ISBN 0-9770095-1-3 $250.00

For more information, visit https://lnkd.in/gwEXa4JD

08/11/2026

Who was Yolanda López?

Yolanda López, born on November 1, 1942, was an influential American painter and graphic artist whose work boldly celebrated Chicana identity, womanhood, and social justice. Best known for her groundbreaking Guadalupe series, López reimagined cultural symbols to empower Mexican-American women and challenge stereotypes through vibrant, unapologetic visual storytelling.

To learn more about women's history, go to the National Women's History Alliance at https://nationalwomenshistoryalliance.org !

Picture Credits: Alexa "LexMex" Treviño

08/07/2026

Why haven’t we learned that women’s history is a key part of American history? Both women and men were revolutionaries – only women had to wait another 144 years to freely exercise their rights.

Fortunately, the story of women’s great quest for democracy is finally told in a compelling and readable way with more than 960 historical photographs and original documents that bring the grassroots movement alive.

“Winning the Vote: The Triumph of the American Woman Suffrage Movement,” by Robert P. J. Cooney, Jr., reflects 12 years of work, the advice of experts in the field, and rarely seen visual material from throughout the country. This independently produced, 496-page book was named one of the “Five Best Books” on the subject and has been lauded by curators as ”the Bible of the suffrage movement.”

Order through the National Women’s History Alliance: https://lnkd.in/en9fhEcf or contact [email protected].

For more information, visit https://lnkd.in/gwEXa4JD

08/06/2026

For Alice Paul, securing women’s suffrage in 1920 was never the final destination, but rather the first step toward complete legal, social, and economic equality for women.

Instead of stepping back after this historic victory, Alice immediately pivoted to the broader fight for legal equality. In 1923, at the seventy-fifth anniversary of the 1848 Seneca Falls Convention, Alice introduced the original draft of the Equal Rights Amendment, then known as the "Lucretia Mott Amendment," which stated that men and women shall have equal rights throughout the United States.

In 1943, Alice rewrote the amendment modeling it directly after the Fifteenth and Nineteenth Amendments. The current text reads: 1. Equality of Rights under the law shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or any state on account of s*x. Section 2. The Congress shall have the power to enforce, by appropriate legislation, the provisions of this article. Section 3. This amendment shall take effect two years after the date of ratification. It has been introduced in Congress every session since 1923. The ERA finally passed Congress in the above form in 1972, but was not ratified by the necessary thirty-eight states by the July 1982 deadline. It still gets reintroduced in Congress in every session but has yet to make it out to the general voting population again.

For more on Alice Paul: https://www.alicepaul.org/about-alice-paul/

For more on the Equal Rights Amendment: https://www.equalrightsamendment.org/

Photo: Wikimedia Commons https://tinyurl.com/bde52mwa

07/30/2026

It’s the 250th Anniversary of the United States of America – Where Are The Women?

The answer is they’re hard to find during this national celebration. There is little mention of women in any of the official Semiquincentennial documents and virtually nothing on women’s long quest for freedom and democracy beyond non-profits’ websites. This is a shameful and apparently deliberate historical omission. It reminds us that ignoring women has long been a dark part of the American experiment.

Why haven’t we learned that women’s history is a key part of American history? Both women and men were revolutionaries – only women had to wait another 144 years to freely exercise their rights.

Fortunately, the story of women’s great quest for democracy is finally told in a compelling and readable way with more than 960 historical photographs and original documents that bring the grassroots movement alive. “Winning the Vote: The Triumph of the American Woman Suffrage Movement,” by Robert P. J. Cooney, Jr., reflects 12 years of work, the advice of experts in the field, and rarely seen visual material from throughout the country. This independently produced, 496-page book was named one of the “Five Best Books” on the subject and has been lauded by curators as ”the Bible of the suffrage movement.”

Make sure women are included in your recognition of the country’s 250th anniversary – and from now on. You and your loved ones will get years of enjoyment from your own treasured copy of “Winning the Vote” – a critical reminder of how important women have been in American history.

Order through the National Women’s History Alliance: https://national-womens-history-alliance.mybigcommerce.com or contact [email protected].

A deluxe Special Edition is also available for display, presentations and special collections, limited to 100 signed and numbered copies, bound in purple silk cloth and housed in a matching, gold-embossed slipcase with an exclusive opening photographic essay. ISBN 0-9770095-1-3 $250.00

For more information, visit https://americangraphicpress.com

07/28/2026

Who was Leonora O’Reilly?

Leonora “Nora” O'Reilly born in 1870 on New York City's Lower East Side to Irish immigrants, she began working in the garment industry at age eleven. This early exposure to harsh working conditions forged her lifelong commitment to labor reform.

By sixteen, she joined the Knights of Labor, learning the fundamentals of organizing that later helped her co-found the Women's Trade Union League in 1903. Through the League, she bridged class divides between working women and affluent reformers while promoting vocational education for young female workers.

Recognizing that economic security required political power, O'Reilly co-founded the Wage Earner's League for Women's Suffrage in 1911. She traveled the nation framing the ballot as an essential tool to defeat child labor and secure fair wages. Her vision of social justice spanned multiple movements; she helped establish the NAACP in 1909, aligned herself with socialist politics, and represented American labor at international peace congresses in The Hague and Washington, D.C.

O'Reilly also poured her energy into the Irish independence movement. Following the 1916 Easter Rising, she partnered with Dr. Gertrude B. Kelly to raise relief funds for the families of Irish Volunteers, operating a successful New York tea shop that yielded thousands of dollars for the cause. In 1917, she co-founded the Irish Progressive League to champion self-determination abroad. Though declining health limited her official roles in later years, she maintained an active schedule of public speaking until her death in 1927, leaving a legacy of unwavering solidarity across working-class, feminist, and international lines.

For more about Nora:

https://digital.janeaddams.ramapo.edu/items/show/2624

To learn more about the Women’s Trade Union League go to

https://www.britannica.com/topic/Womens-Trade-Union-League

To learn more about women's history, go to the National Women's History Alliance at https://nationalwomenshistoryalliance.org !

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730 2nd Street, PO Box 469
Santa Rosa, CA
95402

Website

https://nationalwomenshistoryalliance.org/

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