National Women's History Month

The Schlesinger Library at Harvard's Radcliffe Institute

This seminal collection dates from 1943 when alumna Maud Wood Park (pictured, right), a leader in the suffrage movement, donated her collection of papers, books and memorabilia to form the "Woman's Rights Collection." Originally known as the Women's Archives, the research library was renamed in 1965 after Harvard historian Arthur Meier Schlesinger and his wife Elizabeth Bancroft Schlesinger who were avid supporters of its mission.

The collection's archive dates from the founding of the U.S. and is strong in the areas of women's rights, feminism, health, social reform and women's professional lives. Highlights include photographs by Jessie Tarbox Beals, the first female staff photographer for a U.S. newspaper, photographs of women's suffrage including portraits of the movement's leaders, and photographs of Margaret Higgins Sanger and Mary Ware Dennett, who started the first birth control movement in the U.S. in 1914. Also included are photographs of Amelia Earhart and first lady Eleanor Roosevelt and many images of female factory workers and women in military roles during WWII.

The collection went through a massive expansion during the feminist movement of the 60s and 70s. Portraits of Betty Friedan, activist and author of "The Feminine Mystique," and Bella Abzug, fellow founder of the National Women's Political Caucus, are highlights.

The U.S. Women's Rights Movement was kicked-off unofficially on July 13,1848 during a tea attended by Elizabeth Cady Stanton and four friends. On July 19, less than a week later, Stanton held a convention in Seneca Falls, NY to discuss the "social, civil and religious condition and rights of women." It would be a gradual process that would culminate in 1920 with the ratification of the Nineteenth Ammendment to the U.S. Constitution. In addition to the Schlesinger Library, many other American collections are sources of material related to the women's movement, including Virginia Historical Society and the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston.

The Bridgeman archive represents several collections that have a wealth of images on the worldwide women's rights movement. Archives Charmet holds photographs and ephemera of the French struggle, which was the first modern suffrage movement, beginning in the late 18th century.  The Stapleton Collection, Mirrorpix and the Museum of London are wonderful archives full of material relating to the British suffrage movement, in particular the mother-daughter force of Emmeline and Christabel Pankhurst.

View images from the Schlesinger Library currently available online.

View images of the worldwide women's suffrage movement.

Topical image search:  feminism.

Looking for something in particular and cannot locate it on our website? Email us at newyork@bridgemanart.com. Bridgeman researchers can help you source images from our partner collections.