Ever wondered what the space race, modern programming and household appliances like the dishwasher have in common? Each was shaped by women—just some of the many whose contributions have been overlooked throughout history.
Women—including Ada Lovelace; Katherine Johnson, Mary Jackson, and Dorothy Vaughan; and Josaphine Crochane, from the examples above—have driven innovation, led movements and shaped industries throughout history, yet their work has often been ignored or credited to men. In honor of Women’s History Month, The Daily sat down with Einav Rabinovitch-Fox, a historian at Case Western Reserve University specializing in modern American and women’s and gender history, to explore the vital yet often unrecognized role of women in shaping history.
“There are so many women in history whose work and contributions are still unknown or unrecognized,” said Rabinovitch-Fox. “We need to remember that women are not outside of history or a separate or special section of history, but an integral part of it.”
Read on to discover more from Rabinovitch-Fox about the impact women have had throughout history.
Q: What are some everyday technologies or policies that exist today because of women’s contributions?
Rabinovitch-Fox: Women were always part of technological developments and evolutions, and our life would be unimaginable without their contributions. These range from Ada Lovelace whose work in the 1840s laid the groundwork for the first computer, to Josaphine Cochrane who invented the dishwasher, and one of my personal favorites: Sara Little Turnbull, who was a designer for 3M, and one of her bra designs served as the prototype for the N95 mask that we all got to wear during the pandemic.
Q: Can you highlight a historical moment where women’s involvement was crucial but often goes unrecognized?
Rabinovitch-Fox: Maybe the most “famous” case is the contributions of Rosalind Franklin, whose discoveries and research was crucial to understanding of the DNA, but she herself never got the recognition for it in her lifetime and did not share the Nobel prize that her male partners received.
The work of Black mathematicians and engineers such as Kathrine Johnson and Mary Jackson was also unrecognized for many years, until the film Hidden Figures revealed their story, but like them there were many women whose contributions to the space race, as well as to the ENIAC program (first computers and missile defense program) during WWII were just as important but often went unrecognized.
Hedy Lamarr, the famous Hollywood actress is also a case in point. She pioneered the communication technology that is the basis of wi-fi and GPS, which started as a patent she invented for guiding torpedoes during WWII. The Navy dismissed her invention and declined to use it, and only in the 1990s did she get recognition for her achievements.
Q: What challenges have women historically faced in receiving credit for their innovations?
Rabinovitch-Fox: Women have faced all kinds of barriers, whether because of their gender, their race, or their class. In the past there were laws that prevented women from taking an equal role in society that barred them from education or from certain types of jobs. Women often had to fight to get into schools, into the workplace, or just to get recognition for their achievements. But their contributions are also a testament to their resilience and perseverance.
Q: Are there any particular women from history who you think more people should know about?
Rabinovitch-Fox: Apart from all the wonderful inventors I already mentioned, I would like for people to know about the work of women in other fields other than science and technology who fought to make our world and our society better. I’m particularly thinking about Clara Lemlich and Rose Schneiderman, two Jewish immigrants, who led the great garment workers strike in 1909 and fought for not only better wages but also for safer working conditions that we all enjoy today.
I would also like people to be familiar with the names of Ella Baker and Septima Clark, two Black civil rights activists whose contributions to the movement were as important as Martin Luther King Jr.’s. Clark developed citizenship and freedom schools and worked for voting rights, while Baker was a brilliant organizer who helped form the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC).
Q: How has the portrayal of women’s contributions in history evolved over time?
Rabinovitch-Fox: History is women’s history and women’s history is history. While in recent years there has been more effort to uncover and highlight women’s contributions and to make this history more available to people, I think there is still a way to go before we really integrate women in history and see them as part of the story—as they are.