In 1889, the editor of a British magazine asked single women to write and explain why they were not married.
"Because I have other professions open to me in which the hours are shorter, the work more agreeable, and the pay possibly better." — Miss Florence Watts, 29 High Street
"Because (like a piece of rare china) I am breakable, and mendable, but difficult to match." — Miss S. A. Roberts, The Poplars
"Because I am like the Rifle Volunteers: always ready, but not yet wanted." — Miss Annie Thompson, No 2A, Belmont Street
“Of all the men alive I never yet beheld that special face which I could fancy more than any other.” — Miss Lizzie Moore, 12 Foulser Road
"Because I do not care to enlarge my menagerie of pets, and I find the animal man less docile than a dog, less affectionate than a cat, and less amusing than a monkey." — Miss Sparrow, 9 Manor Place
- “Because I am an English lady, and the Americans monopolize the market.” — Miss Jessie Davies, 16, Claremont Road, Birmingham
And since today is International Day of Women and Girls in Science, let's highlight a few of them - just a few women among thousands of others who helped shape the world we live in today.
Thread.
Dorothy Hodgkin discovered the structure of insulin after 36 years of work.
"I was captured for life by chemistry and by crystals."
Sophia Jex-Blake fought for women's rights to study medicine. She was involved in founding two medical schools for women.
"It seemed discreditable to Great Britain that all her daughters who desired a University education should be driven abroad to seek it."
Colorized by me: Mother and child, Italian, Ellis Island, 1905.
Original caption: This beautiful mother and child sit outside the detention cell. Sometimes 1700 immigrants were crowded into a room which was built to accommodate 600.
In 1911, Kanno Sugako - a Japanese anarchist, was executed for her part in a plot to assassinate the Emperor. She remains the only woman to be executed in Japan for treason. Radicalized at the age of 14 after being raped, she was one of Japan’s first advocates of women’s rights.
A short prison diary was kept by her.
January 23: "If I could return as a ghost, there are so many people, beginning with the judge of the Court of Cassation, that I would like to terrify. It would be wonderful to scare them witless and make them grovel."
January 23: "Truthfully, I really don’t care if they burn me and scatter my ashes in the wind, or if they throw my body in Shinagawa River. So if I am to be buried, I really want to be buried next to my younger sister."
On the eruption of Mount Vesuvius, Pliny the Younger, 79 AD:
"We had scarcely sat down when a darkness came that was not like a moonless or cloudy night, but more like the black of closed and unlighted rooms. You could hear women lamenting, children crying, men shouting. /1
Some were calling for parents, others for children or spouses; they could only recognize them by their voices. Some bemoaned their own lot, other that of their near and dear. There were some so afraid of death that they prayed for death. /2
Many raised their hands to the gods and even more believed that there were no gods any longer and that this was one last unending night for the world."