Rosalyn Drexler is an ex-professional wrestler whose experience as ‘Rosa the Mexican Spitfire’ influenced her subsequent work as a visual artist and writer, and who is now becoming recognized as a key feminist voice in the Pop Art movement.
Alice Coachman was the first Black woman from any country to win an Olympic gold medal. Growing up in the segregated South, she overcame discrimination and unequal access to inspire generations of other black athletes to reach for their athletic goals.
Botanist, mycologist, mountaineer, teacher
Amelia Jenks Bloomer was an early suffragist, editor, and social activist. Bloomer was also a fashion advocate who worked to change women’s clothing styles.
Annie Oakley is a famous markswoman known for her sharpshooting. During her lifetime she traveled with her husband across the country and abroad showing off her skills with a rifle. She became a star in a male-dominated sport, and legendary throughout the world.
Despite being told as a child she would never walk again, Wilma Rudolph relentlessly pursued her dreams becoming an international track and field star. At the height of her career, “the fastest woman in the world” used her platform to shed light on social issues.
One of America’s foremost female athletes, Mildred Ella “Babe” Didrikson Zaharias was an Olympic gold medal winner who broke world records in multiple sports and went on to found the Ladies Pro Golf Association.
Nellie Vladimirovna Kim was a Soviet gymnast who won three gold medals and a silver medal at the 1976 Summer Olympics in Montreal, and two gold medals at the 1980 Summer Olympics. She was the second woman in Olympic history to earn a perfect 10 score (after Nadia Comăneci, also at the 1876 Olympics), and the first woman to score it on the vault and on the floor exercise. Kim worked for many years as a coach, training several national teams, and judged many major international competitions. Serving as President of the Women’s Artistic Gymnastics Technical Committee, she coordinates the introduction of new rules in women’s gymnastics. Her athletic performances are remembered for “her strong feminine, temperamental and charismatic appeal”.
Nicknamed “The Goldfish,” Yana Oleksandrivna Klochkova is a Ukrainian swimmer, who won five Olympic medals (four gold, one silver) at the 2000 and 2004 Olympic Games in the 200 meter individual medley and the 400 meter individual medley at the 2000 and 2004 Summer Olympics and the 800 meter freestyle at the 2000 Summer Olympics.
The first known all-girls tackle American football league in the United States, the Utah Girls Tackle Football League, was formed in March 2015. The non-profit, volunteer-run youth league has since expanded to include three age divisions: elementary (grades 3-6), junior high (grades 7-8), and high school, with 400 girls on 24 teams as of 2020; 35% of the players are members of minority groups.
Football player Sam Gordon, who garnered acclaim playing with the boys when she was 9 years old, helped found the league and has played in it each season since.