August 24

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Women peacemakers born today

  • 1808 Mary Ann White Johnson born Westmoreland, NH (d. 1872). Abolitionist; lecturer on physiology. Founding member of world's first nonviolence group, New England Non-Resistance Society, Boston, 1838. As matron at Sing Sing Prison, became advocate for prison reform.

  • 1860 Laura Drake Gill born Chesterville, ME (d. 1926). Math teacher; Dean at Barnard College; President of Sewanee College; organized first women's placement service; relieved orphans of war as Red Cross nurse in Cuba 1898.

  • 1862 Zonia Baber born Kansas, Clark Co, IL (d. 1956). Geography professor; feminist; pacifist; anti-racist; anti-imperialist; WILPF member of Balch mission to Haiti 1926 leading to end of US military occupation; promoted Puerto Rican suffrage; mapped world peace monuments.

  • 1877 Madeleine Z. Doty born Bayonne, NJ (d. 1963). Lawyer; World War I correspondent; pacifist; WILPF founding member; first international secretary 1925-31; started first Junior Year Abroad in Geneva 1938; advocated prison reform after spending voluntary week in prison.

  • 1895 Carol Weiss King born Manhattan, NY (d. 1952). Human rights lawyer who defended unpopular immigrants.

  • 1928 Angie Brooks born Virginia, Liberia (d. 2007). Lawyer; President UN General Assembly 1970; Liberian envoy to UN 1954; President UN Trusteeship Council 1966 which oversaw independence of Togo and Cameroon.

  • 1951 Maha Abu-Dayyeh Shamas born Palestine (d. 2015). Palestinian human rights leader; feminist. Co-founder and Director, Women’s Centre for Legal Aid and Counseling, E. Jerusalem, 1991-2015. Received French Republic Human Rights Award, 1998; named Ms. Woman of the Year, 2002.

  • 1954 Ulla Røder born Denmark. Ploughshares protester, sprayed "USELESS" on British sub; disabled Mayfair nuclear raft Loch Goil 1999 for which Trident trio were tried and acquitted.

  • 1979 Fransziska Brantner born Lörrach, South Baden, Germany. Expert on UN reform; Green member Reichstag 2013; European Parliament 2009-13; foreign affairs spokesperson for Greens; promoted European Institute for Peace for conflict resolution; active in creation of European External Action Service; opposed European Somalia mission 2014, 2016; abstained on UN missions to Afghanistan 2014, Darfur 2013, South Sudan 2014, Central African Republic 2014.

Women's peacemaking on this day

  • 1945 Jessie Hughan and Frances Witherspoon advocated abolition of atomic bomb.

  • 1950 Edith Sampson became first African-American woman appointed to UN by US.

  • 1996 Women’s Peace Forum demanding peace, Arawa, Bougainville.

  • 2014 The Global Network of Women Peacebuilders held Girl Ambassadors for Peace training of 12 young women to promote women and peace & security issues in Kivu, Congo.

  • 2015 In Nelson, British Columbia, the Peacemaking Collective held Young Women’s Peace Camp.