Women's History Month

The Library of Congress, National Archives and Records Administration, National Endowment for the Humanities, National Gallery of Art, National Park Service, Smithsonian Institution and United States Holocaust Memorial Museum join in paying tribute to the generations of women whose commitment to nature and the planet have proved invaluable to society.

Before the 1970s, the topic of women’s history was largely missing from general public consciousness. To address this situation, the Education Task Force of the Sonoma County (California) Commission on the Status of Women initiated a “Women’s History Week” celebration in 1978 and chose the week of March 8 to coincide with International Women’s Day.

In 1987, the National Women’s History Project petitioned Congress to expand the celebration to the entire month of March. Since then, the National Women’s History Month Resolution has been approved every year with bipartisan support in both the House and Senate.

Source: National Women’s History Project

About This Year's Theme: Our History is Our Strength
“Our shared history unites families, communities, and nations. Although women’s history is intertwined with the history shared with men, several factors - social, religious, economic, and biological - have worked to create a unique sphere of women's history.”

Source: National Women’s History Project

Women’s History Month @ Your Library
Hill Freeman Library & Spruill Learning Center is celebrating all women of the world this month. From the female convicts who were forced into Australia by the British government in the Nineteenth Century to the American feminists of the 1960s, the library has books and other sources of information about the illustrious history of women.

There is a display of recommended titles and other media on the second floor of the library which reflect women’s history in America as well as around the world throughout time.

Books include:
Convict Maids: The Forced Migration of Women to Australia, by Deborah Oxley (This is a Year of Oceania book!)
Madame Curie: A Biography, by Eve Curie.
Rural Women in Urban China: Gender, Migration, and Social Change, by Tamara Jacka
Who Cooked the Last Supper? The Women’s History of the World, by Rosalind Miles
A German Women’s Movement: Class and Gender in Hanover, 1860-1933, by Nancy R. Reagin
Women in Revolutionary Paris, 1789-1795, by Levy, Applewhite, and Johnson

…and many more!

The library also has access to databases such as Women and Social Movements and North American Women’s Drama, both available through the library’s website.

Additional Resources Online

Women’s History Month at the National Women’s History Project


Women’s History Month at the Library of Congress


Women’s History Month Activities, History, Timelines, Ideas, Facts and Quizzes


Free Resources for Women’s History Month