Famous 19th Century Activists

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 1 
Harriet Tubman
(Activist and Abolitionist Known for Her Efforts in Rescuing Slaves and Abolition of Slavery)
Harriet Tubman
27
Birthdate: 1822
Sun Sign: Pisces
Birthplace: Dorchester County, Maryland, United States
Died: March 10, 1913

Born to parents who were bonded slaves, Harriet Tubman life was a difficult one from the very beginning. Yet with her remarkable courage and determination, she not only escaped slavery herself, but also led other enslaved people to freedom. The prominent political activist and abolitionist was also the first woman to lead an armed expedition during the American Civil War.

 2 
Susan B. Anthony
(Social Reformer and Women's Rights Activist Who Was a Pioneer Crusader for the Women’s Suffrage Movement)
Susan B. Anthony
24
Birthdate: February 15, 1820
Sun Sign: Aquarius
Birthplace: Adams, Massachusetts, United States
Died: March 13, 1906

Susan B. Anthony's vital role in the women's suffrage movement changed the course of history. She led one of the two national suffrage organizations, which later became the National American Woman Suffrage Association, with Susan as its leading force. She also played an instrumental role in publishing The Revolution, a women's rights newspaper.

 3 
Sojourner Truth
(Abolitionist and Women's Rights Activist)
Sojourner Truth
12
Birthdate: 1797 AD
Birthplace: Rifton, New York, United States
Died: November 26, 1883

Sojourner Truth was an American women's rights activist and abolitionist. Born into slavery, Truth escaped to freedom in 1826. She then approached the court to recover her son, subsequently becoming the first black woman to emerge successful against a white man in such a case. In 2014, she was named in Smithsonian's 100 Most Significant Americans of All Time list.

 4 
Emmeline Pankhurst
(English Political Activist Who Organised the UK Suffragette Movement)
Emmeline Pankhurst
10
Birthdate: July 15, 1858
Sun Sign: Cancer
Birthplace: Moss Side, Manchester, United Kingdom
Died: June 14, 1928
Emmeline Pankhurst was a British political activist best remembered for helping women earn the right to vote in elections by organizing the UK suffragette movement. For playing a major role in achieving women's suffrage in the UK, Pankhurst was named in Time magazine's 100 Most Important People of the 20th Century list in 1999.
 5 
Dorothy Day
(American Social Activist, Journalist, and Anarchist)
Dorothy Day
3
Birthdate: November 8, 1897
Sun Sign: Scorpio
Birthplace: Brooklyn, New York, United States
Died: November 29, 1980

Dorothy Day was an American social activist, journalist, and anarchist. She is best remembered for co-founding the Catholic Worker Movement along with French activist Peter Maurin. She also co-founded a newspaper called Catholic Worker and served as its editor between 1933 and 1980. In 2001, Dorothy Day was made an inductee of the National Women's Hall of Fame.

 6 
Alice Paul
(American Quaker, Feminist, Suffragist, and Women's Rights Activist)
Alice Paul
3
Birthdate: January 11, 1885
Sun Sign: Capricorn
Birthplace: Mount Laurel Township, New Jersey, United States
Died: July 9, 1977

Alice Paul was an American Quaker, feminist, suffragist, and women's rights activist. She is best remembered for strategizing events like the Silent Sentinels and the Woman Suffrage Procession, which resulted in the passage of the Nineteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution in 1920. Alice Paul often displayed courage while confronting police brutality for her activism.

 7 
Helen Keller
(American Author and First Deaf-Blind Person to Earn a Bachelor of Arts Degree)
Helen Keller
13
Birthdate: June 27, 1880
Sun Sign: Cancer
Birthplace: Tuscumbia, Alabama, United States
Died: June 1, 1968

A prolific author, having written 12 published books and several articles, Helen Keller was the first deaf-blind person to earn a Bachelor of Arts degree. Her autobiography, The Story of My Life, made Keller famous and was adapted for film and stage. She was also an activist and campaigned for women's suffrage, labour rights, socialism and other such causes.

 8 
Mary McLeod Bethune
(American Civil Rights Activist and Founder of the 'National Council of Negro Women')
Mary McLeod Bethune
5
Birthdate: July 10, 1875
Sun Sign: Cancer
Birthplace: Mayesville, South Carolina, United States
Died: May 18, 1955

Mary McLeod Bethune was an American civil rights activist, educator, womanist, humanitarian, and philanthropist. She is credited with founding the National Council of Negro Women. Bethune also played a key role in the creation of the Black Cabinet while serving as an adviser to Franklin Roosevelt. In 1973, Bethune was made an indutee of the National Women's Hall of Fame.

 9 
W. E. B. Du Bois
(Civil Rights Activists)
W. E. B. Du Bois
14
Birthdate: February 23, 1868
Sun Sign: Pisces
Birthplace: Great Barrington, Massachusetts, United States
Died: August 27, 1963

W. E. B. Du Bois was an American civil rights activist, sociologist, and Pan-Africanist. Du Bois played an instrumental role in fighting for full civil rights for people of color around the world. A co-founder of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, Du Bois also played an important role as the leader of the Niagara Movement.

 10 
Jeannette Rankin
(Feminist Politician & the First Woman to be Part of the US Congress and Only from Montana)
Jeannette Rankin
3
Birthdate: June 11, 1880
Sun Sign: Gemini
Birthplace: Missoula
Died: May 18, 1973

Jeannette Rankin scripted history as the first female member of the US Congress. A feminist, she was also associated with the women’s suffrage movement. Earlier, the Republican worked as a dressmaker, a furniture designer, and a teacher. She was the only legislator to vote against war after the Pearl Harbor incident.

 11 
Marcus Garvey
(Jamaican Political Activist, Journalist and Founder and First President-General of the Universal Negro Improvement Association)
Marcus Garvey
4
Birthdate: August 17, 1887
Sun Sign: Leo
Birthplace: Saint Ann's Bay, Jamaica
Died: June 10, 1940
Marcus Garvey is remembered as an iconic Black separatist leader who believed that all African-origin people in Europe and America should go back to Africa. He established the Universal Negro Improvement Association, but his activism was not accepted by civil rights activists, who believed in racial integration and not segregation.
 12 
Margaret Sanger
(Birth Control Activist Who Opened the First Birth Control Clinic in the United States)
Margaret Sanger
6
Birthdate: September 14, 1879
Sun Sign: Virgo
Birthplace: Corning, New York, United States
Died: September 6, 1966

Margaret Sanger was an American writer and sex educator. She is credited with popularizing the term birth control. A birth control activist, Sanger established the first birth control clinic in America. She also set up organizations that later became the well-known non-profit organization Planned Parenthood Federation of America. She also played a key role in legalizing contraception in the US.

 13 
Ida B. Wells
(Women's Rights Activist and Civil Rights Leader)
Ida B. Wells
4
Birthdate: July 16, 1862
Sun Sign: Cancer
Birthplace: Holly Springs, Mississippi, United States
Died: March 25, 1931
Civil rights and women's rights activist Ida B. Wells is remembered for speaking up against the lynching of Blacks in the U.S. She was born a slave and freed by the Emancipation Proclamation. She later co-founded the NAACP. She also co-owned and wrote for Memphis Free Speech and Headlight.
 14 
Solomon Northup
5
Birthdate: July 10, 1807
Sun Sign: Cancer
Birthplace: Minerva, New York
Died: 1863 AD
Abolitionist Solomon Northup had authored the memoir Twelve Years a Slave, which was later adapted into the Academy Award-winning film 12 Years a Slave. Northup was abducted and sold as a slave to a planter in Louisiana. He was eventually freed with the help of the governor New York.
 15 
Emma Goldman
(American Anarchist Political Activist and Writer)
Emma Goldman
6
Birthdate: June 27, 1869
Sun Sign: Cancer
Birthplace: Kaunas, Lithuania
Died: May 14, 1940

Emma Goldman was a writer and anarchist political activist. She played an important role in popularizing the anarchist political philosophy in Europe and North America in the early and mid-20th century. Her lectures and writing spanned a wide variety of subjects, such as atheism, militarism, freedom of speech, homosexuality, capitalism, and free love.

 16 
Jane Addams
(Reformer and Social Activist Who Became the First American Woman to be Awarded the Nobel Peace Prize)
Jane Addams
3
Birthdate: September 6, 1860
Sun Sign: Virgo
Birthplace: Cedarville, Illinois, U.S.
Died: May 21, 1935

Jane Addams was an American social worker, reformer, settlement activist, public administrator, sociologist, and author. Addams was a prominent leader in the history of women's suffrage and social work in the USA. She is credited with co-founding one of America's most popular settlement houses, the Hull House in Chicago. Addams is also credited with co-founding the American Civil Liberties Union.

 17 
Victoria Woodhull
(The First Woman to Run for the American Presidency)
Victoria Woodhull
4
Birthdate: September 23, 1838
Sun Sign: Libra
Birthplace: Homer, Ohio, United States
Died: June 9, 1927

Victoria Woodhull was an American politician, suffragist, and writer who played an important role in the women's suffrage movement. She is credited with founding Woodhull & Claflin's Weekly, America's first newspaper to be founded by a woman. Her life and career inspired the Broadway musical Onward Victoria. In 2001, she was posthumously inducted into the National Women's Hall of Fame.

 18 
Pearl Buck
(Winner of the 1938 Nobel Prize in Literature)
Pearl Buck
3
Birthdate: June 26, 1892
Sun Sign: Cancer
Birthplace: Hillsboro
Died: March 6, 1973

Nobel Prize- and Pulitzer Prize-winning American author Pearl Buck was raised in China by her missionary parents. She grew up to teach English literature in Chinese universities and later penned books such as East Wind, West Wind and The Good Earth, which were based on her experiences in China.

 19 
William Lloyd Garrison
(Abolitionist, Journalist and Founder of the Anti-Slavery Newspaper ‘The Liberator’)
William Lloyd Garrison
4
Birthdate: December 10, 1805
Sun Sign: Sagittarius
Birthplace: Newburyport, Massachusetts, United States
Died: May 24, 1879

William Lloyd Garrison was an American journalist, abolitionist, social reformer, and suffragist. He is best remembered for founding The Liberator, an anti-slavery newspaper, which was published from 1831 to 1865. He also co-founded the American Anti-Slavery Society which helped fight slavery in the United States. In the 1870s, William Lloyd Garrison was an important figure in the women's suffrage movement.

 20 
Elizabeth Cady Stanton
(American Women's Rights Activist and Key Figure Behind 'Seneca Falls Convention')
Elizabeth Cady Stanton
4
Birthdate: November 12, 1815
Sun Sign: Scorpio
Birthplace: Johnstown
Died: October 26, 1902

American women’s rights activist Elizabeth Cady Stanton first came to know about laws that discriminated against women while studying law books in the office of her father, who was a prominent judge. She later became the president of the National Woman Suffrage Association and co-wrote books such as The Woman's Bible.

 21 
Jacob Riis
(Danish-American Social Reformer & Social Documentary Photographer)
Jacob Riis
3
Birthdate: May 3, 1849
Sun Sign: Taurus
Birthplace: Ribe
Died: May 26, 1914
 22 
Anna Leonowens
(British Travel Writer, Educator, and Social Activist)
Anna Leonowens
3
Birthdate: November 5, 1834
Sun Sign: Scorpio
Birthplace: Ahmednagar, India
Died: January 19, 1915

Indian-born British author Anna Leonowens is best remembered for her memoir The English Governess at the Siamese Court, which related her experience as a governess of the children of King Mongkut of Siam. The musical The King and I and the novel Anna and the King of Siam were inspired by her life.

 23 
Lucy Burns
(American Suffragist and Women’s Rights Activist)
Lucy Burns
2
Birthdate: July 28, 1879
Sun Sign: Leo
Birthplace: Brooklyn, New York City, New York, United States
Died: December 22, 1966
 24 
A. Philip Randolph
(Leader of the African-American civil-rights movement,)
A. Philip Randolph
3
Birthdate: April 15, 1889
Sun Sign: Aries
Birthplace: Crescent City
Died: May 16, 1979
 25 
Mary Edwards Walker
(Surgeon, Feminist, Activist)
Mary Edwards Walker
3
Birthdate: November 26, 1832
Sun Sign: Sagittarius
Birthplace: Oswego
Died: February 21, 1919

Mary Edwards Walker, or Dr. Mary Walker, was the only female surgeon who served injured soldiers during the American Civil War. A dress reform supporter, she believed women should value comfort more than tradition when it came to clothes. She was also the first and only Medal of Honor winner.

 26 
James Weldon Johnson
3
Birthdate: June 17, 1871
Sun Sign: Gemini
Birthplace: Jacksonville, Florida, United States
Died: June 26, 1938
 27 
Emily Davison
(English Suffragette Who Fought for Votes for Women in Britain in the Early 20th Century)
Emily Davison
3
Birthdate: October 11, 1872
Sun Sign: Libra
Birthplace: London, England
Died: June 8, 1913

Activist Emily Davison is remembered for her relentless fight for women’s suffrage. As part of her protest, at the 1913 Epsom Derby, she went in front of King George V’s horse, to attach suffragette flags to it, and was tragically trampled to death. Some regard her as a martyr for women’s causes.

 28 
Kasturba Gandhi
(Wife of Mahatama Gandhi)
Kasturba Gandhi
3
Birthdate: April 11, 1869
Sun Sign: Aries
Birthplace: Porbandar
Died: February 22, 1944

Kasturba Gandhi was an Indian freedom fighter and political activist. Best remembered as the wife of Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi, Kasturba took part in Indian independence movements along with her husband. Her life and career inspired a play titled Kasturba which was written by Narayan Desai and directed by Aditi Desai. The play was staged several times in India.

 29 
Joe Hill
(Songwriter, Trade unionist)
Joe Hill
3
Birthdate: October 7, 1879
Sun Sign: Libra
Birthplace: Gävle
Died: November 19, 1915
 30 
Mary Ann Shadd
(American-Canadian Activist, Journalist, Publisher and the First Black Woman Publisher in North America)
Mary Ann Shadd
3
Birthdate: October 9, 1823
Sun Sign: Libra
Birthplace: Wilmington, Delaware, United States
Died: June 5, 1893

The first North American Black woman to publish a newspaper, USA-born Mary Ann Shadd was the founder of the Canadian newspaper, The Provincial Freeman. Concurrently serving as its anonymous editor and contributor, she also became one of the first women to pursue journalism in Canada. She was also one of the first Black women to earn a degree in law.

 31 
Margaret Fuller
(American Journalist, Critic, Editor, and Women's Rights Advocate)
Margaret Fuller
4
Birthdate: May 23, 1810
Sun Sign: Gemini
Birthplace: Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States
Died: July 19, 1850

Margaret Fuller was an American journalist, critic, editor, women's rights advocate, and translator. She is best remembered for her association with the transcendentalism movement. Her 1843 book Woman in the Nineteenth Century is widely regarded as the first major feminist book in the USA. An advocate of women's rights, Margaret Fuller was the first female war correspondent in the USA.

 32 
Aldo Leopold
(American Author & Environmentalist Who is Best Known for His Book 'A Sand County Almanac')
Aldo Leopold
3
Birthdate: January 11, 1887
Sun Sign: Capricorn
Birthplace: Burlington
Died: April 21, 1948
 33 
Samuel Gompers
(Labor leader, Cigar Maker)
Samuel Gompers
3
Birthdate: January 27, 1850
Sun Sign: Aquarius
Birthplace: London, England
Died: December 13, 1924
 34 
Millicent Fawcett
(Feminist Politcian Who Led the Women's Suffrage Movement in Britain)
Millicent Fawcett
3
Birthdate: June 11, 1847
Sun Sign: Gemini
Birthplace: Aldeburgh, England
Died: August 5, 1929

A pioneering leader of the women’s suffrage movement in Britain, Millicent Fawcett also co-established the Newnham College, Cambridge, which was one of the first English women’s universities. She also served as the president of the National Union of Women's Suffrage Societies and investigated British concentration camps during the South African War.

 35 
Marie Stopes
(Paleobotanist & Women’s Rights Activists)
Marie Stopes
4
Birthdate: October 15, 1880
Sun Sign: Libra
Birthplace: Edinburgh
Died: October 2, 1958

Apart from being a successful botanist, Marie Stopes was also a popular activist, known for her contribution to the feminist cause. A leading supporter of birth control, she established the UK’s first clinic for family planning. She was also known for her books Married Love and Wise Parenthood.

 36 
Rebecca Latimer Felton
(First Woman Who was Appointed to the United States Senate)
Rebecca Latimer Felton
3
Birthdate: June 10, 1835
Sun Sign: Gemini
Birthplace: Decatur, Georgia, United States
Died: January 24, 1930

Writer, lecturer, suffragist, reformer, feminist, politician and slave-owner Rebecca Latimer Felton was the first woman who served in the United States Senate. The most distinguished woman in Georgia during the Progressive Era, Felton was appointed Senator from Georgia as a mark of respect. With this she became the oldest freshman-senator who entered the Senate and served for just 24 hours.    

 37 
Mary Harris Jones
(Irish-born American Schoolteacher and Activist)
Mary Harris Jones
3
Birthdate: May 1, 1830
Sun Sign: Taurus
Birthplace: Cork, Ireland
Died: November 30, 1930

After losing her husband and children in a yellow fever epidemic and her dress shop in the great Chicago fire, schoolteacher and dressmaker Mary Harris Jones became an activist, earning the nickname Mother Jones. A prominent unionist for coal miners and other workers, she also co-founded the Social Democratic Party.

 38 
Lucy Stone
(American Abolitionist, Suffragist, Orator, and Women's Rights Activist)
Lucy Stone
3
Birthdate: August 13, 1818
Sun Sign: Leo
Birthplace: West Brookfield, Massachusetts, U.S.
Died: October 19, 1893

Lucy Stone was an American abolitionist, suffragist, orator, and women's rights activist. She was the first woman to earn a college degree from Massachusetts. Stone played a key role in the formation of the Woman's National Loyal League as well as the American Woman Suffrage Association. In 1986, she was made an inductee of the National Women's Hall of Fame.

 39 
Zitkala-Sa
(Writer)
Zitkala-Sa
3
Birthdate: February 22, 1876
Sun Sign: Pisces
Birthplace: Yankton Reservation, South Dakota, United States
Died: January 26, 1938
 40 
Kate Sheppard
(The Most Prominent Member of the Women's Suffrage Movement in New Zealand)
Kate Sheppard
3
Birthdate: March 10, 1847
Sun Sign: Pisces
Birthplace: Liverpool, England
Died: July 13, 1934

Born in England and educated in Scotland, Kate Sheppard later moved with her family to New Zealand. A fiery feminist, she led the WCTU women’s suffrage campaign, making New Zealand the first country that granted its women the right to vote. She also encouraged women to participate in physical activities.

 41 
Carrie Chapman Catt
(American Women's Suffrage Leader Who Successfully Campaigned for Passing of the ‘Nineteenth Amendment’)
Carrie Chapman Catt
3
Birthdate: January 9, 1859
Sun Sign: Capricorn
Birthplace: Ripon
Died: March 9, 1947

American women's suffrage-leader Carrie Chapman Catt  served as president of National American Woman Suffrage Association (NAWSA), and founded the International Woman Suffrage Alliance (later International Alliance of Women) and League of Women Voters. She is best-known for leading the NAWSA, organising the Winning Plan and playing a pivotal role in passing of the Nineteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution.

 42 
Nellie McClung
(Canadian Author, Politician and Social Activist)
Nellie McClung
3
Birthdate: October 20, 1873
Sun Sign: Libra
Birthplace: Chatsworth, Ontario, Canada
Died: September 1, 1951

Canadian author and social reformer Nellie McClung had struck gold with her first novel, Sowing Seeds in Danny, a bestseller. She also spoke widely about woman suffrage and was part of the Alberta legislature. She was part of The Famous Five, a group of women who launched the Persons Case.

 43 
Mary Parker Follett
(Social Woker)
Mary Parker Follett
3
Birthdate: September 3, 1868
Sun Sign: Virgo
Birthplace: Quincy, Massachusetts, United States
Died: December 18, 1933
 44 
Hilda Doolittle
(Poet)
Hilda Doolittle
3
Birthdate: September 10, 1886
Sun Sign: Virgo
Birthplace: Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, United States
Died: September 27, 1961
 45 
Emily Murphy
(First Female Magistrate in Canada)
Emily Murphy
3
Birthdate: March 14, 1868
Sun Sign: Pisces
Died: October 17, 1933

Canadian women’s rights activist Emily Murphy was part of The Famous Five, a group of women activists who launched the Persons Case to make women eligible to be part of the Senate. Murphy also served as the first police magistrate in Canada and the British Empire.

 46 
Buenaventura Durruti
(Anarcho-syndicalist, Anarchist, Trade unionist)
Buenaventura Durruti
3
Birthdate: July 14, 1896
Sun Sign: Cancer
Birthplace: León
Died: November 20, 1936
 47 
Angelina Grimke
(American Political Activist, Abolitionist, and Women's Rights Advocate)
Angelina Grimke
3
Birthdate: February 20, 1805
Sun Sign: Pisces
Birthplace: Charleston, South Carolina, USA
Died: October 26, 1879

Angelina Grimke was an American political activist, abolitionist, women's rights advocate, and promoter of the women's suffrage movement. She is best remembered for the anti-slavery speech which she gave outside Pennsylvania Hall in May 1838. One of her letters regarding anti-slavery was published by William Lloyd Garrison in his newspaper The Liberator in 1835.

 48 
Karađorđe
(Serbian Revolutionary and Freedom Fighter)
Karađorđe
3
Birthdate: November 16, 1768
Sun Sign: Scorpio
Birthplace: Viševac, Serbia
Died: July 26, 1817

Karađorđe was a Serbian revolutionary and freedom fighter. An important figure during the First Serbian Uprising, Karađorđe is best remembered for leading Serbia's fight for independence from the Ottoman Empire in the early 1800s. He is also credited with founding the Karađorđević dynasty. 

 49 
Earl Browder
(Political leader)
Earl Browder
3
Birthdate: May 20, 1891
Sun Sign: Taurus
Birthplace: Wichita, Kansas, United States
Died: June 27, 1973
 50 
Edith Cowan
(Social Campaigner)
Edith Cowan
6
Birthdate: August 2, 1861
Sun Sign: Leo
Birthplace: Geraldton, Australia
Died: June 9, 1932

Edith Cowan was an Australian social reformer best remembered for serving as a member of parliament; she was the first Australian woman to do so. She is also remembered for working for the welfare and rights of children and women. In recognition of her contribution, Cowan has been depicted on Australia's fifty-dollar note since 1995.