There’s nothing the Atlas Obscura community loves more than a surprising story hiding in plain sight, a wondrous tale either forgotten by history or overlooked today, just waiting to be uncovered by the curious.

Too often, the stories of women are the ones that have gotten lost over the years: names left out of the history books, replaced by “his wife” or “his mother” or “his daughter,” or simply erased. In celebration of Women’s History Month 2022, the editors, authors, artists, and community contributors of Atlas Obscura have come together to craft a new history of women.

For the next 31 days, we’ll be telling her stories, highlighting women who helped shaped the world as we know it—and ones who are changing the world right now. We’ll visit every continent and travel across the millennia. We’ll sneak through World War II minefields in the Philippines with a fearless Allied spy, hang by our teeth with Paris’s most celebrated 19th-century aerialist, and trek to the South Pole with the first woman of color to make the arduous trip alone. She did it last month.

We’ll remember the women who fought segregation on the streets of Detroit, championed Indigenous rights in Ecuador, and rescued Tutsis from genocide in Rwanda. And we’ll meet the scholars who are putting women back into every story—from the pirate ships of the high seas to the thrones of the medieval Middle East—with our Q&A series She Was There.

Join us and rediscover the history you thought you knew.

Features

Activist Sylvie Njobati sees the statue of Ngonnso for the first time at the Humboldt Forum in Berlin.
Activist Sylvie Njobati sees the statue of Ngonnso for the first time at the Humboldt Forum in Berlin. MARC SEBASTIAN EILS

Ngonnso Will Finally Come Home to Cameroon by Ye Charlotte Ming

A Paradise for Single Ladies by Anya Jabour

Elizabeth Freeman Demanded Her Freedom—and Helped End Slavery in Massachusetts by Amy Crawford

How Félicité Niyitegeka Saved her Tutsi Neighbors from Genocide in Rwanda by Elizabeth Svoboda

How the ‘First Lady of Seaweed’ Changed Science by Shoshi Parks

She Was There: The Forgotten Female Revolutionaries Behind Latin American Independence by Sarah Durn

For 17 days in Scotland's remote Cairngorms mountains, British traveler Elise Wortley retraced the journey of early-20th-century writer Nan Shepherd.
For 17 days in Scotland’s remote Cairngorms mountains, British traveler Elise Wortley retraced the journey of early-20th-century writer Nan Shepherd. COURTESY OF ELISE WORTLEY

Returning to the Valley of the Assassins in the Footsteps of Explorer Freya Stark by Sarah Durn

Meet the Pioneering Midwives Who Helped Birth the Gulf South by Sharon Lurye

A Whale of a Tale about a Science Breakthrough Ignored for Decades by Madeline Bodin

The Immigrant Women Who Forever Changed the Way Americans Eat by Diana Hubbell

The Educator Stockpiling—and Sharing—Turkey’s Heritage Seeds by Katie Nadworny

For many Crockettes, the job in the test kitchen was glamorous, fulfilling, and “almost subversive.”
For many Crockettes, the job in the test kitchen was glamorous, fulfilling, and “almost subversive.” COURTESY OF THE GENERAL MILLS ARCHIVES

The Unsung Women of the Betty Crocker Test Kitchens by Annie Ewbank

The Black Woman Who Didn’t Just Open Doors—She Moved Them by Carole Rosenblat

Why Is Scotland Apologizing Now for Witch Trials 300 Years Ago? by Sarah Durn

The Woman Who Taught the World How to Fly by April White

The Women Behind the First Black Music Magazine by Ashawnta Jackson

Harpreet Chandi took 40 days to complete her solo 700-mile trek to the South Pole, skiing while pulling a 200-pound pulk, or cargo sled. Here, she trains for the adventure in Norway.
Harpreet Chandi took 40 days to complete her solo 700-mile trek to the South Pole, skiing while pulling a 200-pound pulk, or cargo sled. Here, she trains for the adventure in Norway. UK ARMY / WIKIMEDIA COMMONS OGL 3

This Is What a Polar Explorer Looks Like by Amy Crawford

A Botanical Mystery Solved, After 146 Years by Gemma Tarlach

She Was There: Rediscovering Rome’s Female Merchants by Sarah Durn

The All-Female Culinary Clubs of 20th-Century France by Alex Katsomitros

Inked Sisterhood members gather for a ride through Nairobi and beyond.
Inked Sisterhood members gather for a ride through Nairobi and beyond. KHADIJA FARAH FOR ATLAS OBSCURA

Meet Kenya’s Sisterhood of Badass Bikers by Peace Mundia

Remembering America’s Forgotten ‘Fish Evangelist’ by Ashley Stimpson

How Women—and Their Hair—Transformed South Korea by Wendy Wei

In the Footsteps of Ecuador’s ‘Mama Warrior’ by Kimberley Brown

Series

article-image

Secret Agent Women

by April White

The Invisible, Afflicted Spy Who Led the U.S. Army Into Occupied Manila

A Struggling Actress’s Greatest Role Was as a Real Civil War Spy

The Society Editor Who Just Walked Into Soviet Russia and Started Spying

A Socialite’s Plot to Assassinate a Corrupt Official in Occupied Shanghai

The Mexican Revolutionary Who Fought for Freedom on the Battlefield and in the Barroom

article-image

Women of Extremes

by Michelle Cassidy and Tom Ward

Don’t Call Annie Smith Peck a Woman Mountain Climber

What Tookoolito Taught Explorers About the Arctic

Scientist Katia Krafft Stood on the Edge of Active Volcano Craters

Miss La La Soared Through Europe as the Victorian Era’s Best-Known Aerialist

Annie Londonderry Barely Knew How to Ride a Bike When She Set Off Around the World

Wildlife biologist Serra Hoagland has studied the Mexican spotted owl throughout her career.
Wildlife biologist Serra Hoagland has studied the Mexican spotted owl throughout her career. NATASHA DONOVAN FOR ATLAS OBSCURA

Women in Conservation

by Gemma Tarlach

The Ecologist Who Made Biodiversity Count

The Wildlife Scientist Finding Innovation in Ancient Ideas

The Keeper of Sacred Bees Who Took on a Giant

The Anthropologist Who Has Spent 50 Years Protecting—and Learning From—Orangutans

The ‘Queen of the Mantas’ Who Became a Force of Nature

Places

15 Statues that Celebrate Real Women by Michelle Cassidy

12 Extraordinary Women-Run Restaurants Around the World by Sam O’Brien

21 Places That Celebrate Female Artists by Jonathan Carey

14 Places Created By and For Women by Michelle Cassidy

12 Places to See the Work of Women Architects by Michelle Cassidy

A Feminist Road Trip Across the U.S. by Michelle Cassidy

*This article was updated to include stories from Women’s History Month.