by Emma Duval
Adventure, career changes, international travel, charitable and philanthropic projects … these are goals shared by many childfree women today which were achieved over a hundred years ago by Marie Marvingt (1875–1963), a multi-talented French athlete, aviator, and journalist who was nicknamed the “fiancée of danger.”
[Read more…] about Marie Marvingt: Daredevil, Humanitarian, and Childfree – 100 Years Agoby Emma Palmer, 2018 International Childfree Day Winner
“I’ll be a plantswoman in my next life!” I told my therapy supervisor a while back. I’d been writing about the parallels between gardening and being a therapist. “Maybe you’re already one, in and beyond the therapy room,” she replied. It’s true, being a therapist can feel analogous to tending to soil, to plants, to timing, to observing what’s going on in the broader weather systems.
[Read more…] about Painting with Plants: Paying Tribute to Gertrude JekyllBy Laura S. Scott, Childfree Author & Documentary Filmmaker
I will forgive you if you haven’t heard the name Senda Berenson Abbott. Senda was born under the name Senda Valvrojenski in 1868 in what was then called the Russian Empire. But you might know her as the “Mother of Women’s Basketball.”
[Read more…] about The Person We Call the “Mother of Basketball” Was Never a Mother at Allby Laura S. Scott
Author of Two is Enough: A Couple’s Guide to Living Childless by Choice
Like many of my peers growing up in the 60s and 70s, I was a big fan of Louisa May Alcott’s novel “Little Women.” Although it was written in 1868 (becoming an instant bestseller) these characters still resonated with me 100 years later.
[Read more…] about Louisa May Alcott: A Profile of Courage and Self Determinationby Chelsey Wren
When I reflect on inspirational women without children, Viola Desmond is one of the first to come to mind. As a Canadian, I’m ashamed to admit that I didn’t know about this civil rights trailblazer until earlier this year. Her refusal to give into racial segregation happened almost a decade before Rosa Parks (another civil rights hero who had no children) made a similar stand.
[Read more…] about Viola Desmond, a Canadian Civil Rights Trailblazer
by Rachel Chrastil, Ph.D
London, 1694. At age twenty-eight, Mary Astell held a distinct vision for the life well lived. In her Serious Proposal to the Ladies, Astell proposed that unmarried women seek their spiritual and intellectual improvement in dedicated institutions.
[Read more…] about Mary Astell: A Life With No Children in the 1600s
