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We hear a lot about the Founding Fathers, but what about the Founding Mothers? Make friends with just a few of the extraordinary ladies who made our Independence Day possible!
Abigail Adams: Wife to John Adams, she wrote many letters during the Second Continental Congress, trying to convince her husband that the formation of a new government was an opportunity to make women’s legal status equal to men’s. Her letters to John still survive today, and reveal that she advised him on all aspects of his life and, unusually for the time, was involved in the business aspects of their home.
Mercy Otis Warren: Lauded as the “conscience of the American Revolution,” she was the first female playwright in the US and advocated for women’s education. Although not a feminist by contemporary standards, she felt the minds of both men and women were valuable, and wrote promoting equal rights amongst women regardless of station.
Phillis Wheatley: An enslaved African American poet, and one of the first published female authors in the US. Her 1773 collection of poems was popular in both the US and Europe, and she even read her poem about George Washington to him at his invitation.
Deborah Sampson: Like many women after her in the Civil War, she disguised herself as a man to be able to fight in the war. Fighting under the name of her deceased brother, she was wounded on her thigh and forehead. Not wanting to be found out, she escaped the hospital after they treated her head wound and extracted the bullet from her thigh herself. Although she was privately discovered, the military didn’t discover she was a woman until after her honorable discharge.
Stories of women often don’t get told – so keep sharing yours! Do you have a favorite woman in history? Share her story with us!
Originally posted on kivity.com on July 4th, 2022