Explore the past, present, and future of women in America.
A Feminist Road Trip Across the U.S.

It’s only natural that our journey begins in the town where the American movement for women’s suffrage was born. In July 1848, Seneca Falls hosted the country’s first women's rights convention, held at Wesleyan Chapel. Just down the street, a statue commemorates the moment when activists Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Susan B. Anthony first met. Both are part of the Women’s Rights National Historical Park, which was established in 1980.

In the surrounding area, you can find the homes of a number of notable suffragists as well as Mount Hope Cemetery; there is a long-running tradition of placing “I voted” stickers on Susan B. Anthony’s gravestone to honor her fight for women's right to vote.

Just a few miles away you’ll find the former home of another civil rights activist: Harriet Tubman. After escaping from slavery in Maryland, Tubman led more than a dozen missions to rescue other enslaved people and worked as a scout and spy during the Civil War. In the 1850s, she bought a small farmhouse in Auburn, New York. In addition to her work as an abolitionist, Tubman was a vocal supporter of the women’s suffrage movement.

The park comprises Tubman’s former home, as well as the Tubman Home for the Aged and a church that Tubman helped raise funds to build. She is buried in the town’s Fort Hill Cemetery.

On May 29, 1851, Sojourner Truth delivered a now-famous speech from the Old Stone Church on High Street. Her words had a profound effect on the attendees of the Women's Rights Convention in Akron that day and are remembered as one of the most important feminist and abolitionist speeches in American history—although the version most people know is an inaccurate one.

Though the Old Stone Church is gone, a plaque marks the spot where Truth stood in 1851. It bears the memorable words “Ain’t I a Woman,” which were added in a heavily modified transcript published 12 years later.

In 1931, Jane Addams became the first American woman to win the Nobel Peace Prize. An ardent feminist and social reformer, Addams ran the Hull-House Settlement, which provided housing, childcare, education, and other resources for immigrant families on the west side of Chicago. Though most of the complex has since been demolished, the two remaining buildings have been turned into a museum commemorating Addams’ life and legacy.

Want to learn more about women’s history in Chicago? Take a trip up to Women & Children First, which was opened in the Andersonville neighborhood in 1979 and today is one of the largest feminist bookstores in the country.

About an hour’s drive west from Chicago will take you to Beyer Stadium, home of the Rockford Peaches. The Peaches were one of the teams in the All-American Girls Professional Baseball League (AAGPBL), which you may recognize from the 1992 film A League of Their Own.

After the AAGPBL’s final season in 1954, Beyer Stadium was used for other local sports but began to fall into disrepair. A renovation completed in 2010 brought a new baseball diamond and other improvements; at the dedication ceremony, several AAGPBL players threw out a few ceremonial pitches at the new field. In 2012, Rockford welcomed a new women’s baseball team called the Starfires.

Just off of Interstate 90, a 50-foot stainless steel sculpture towers high above a section of the Missouri River. Known as Dignity of Earth and Sky (often shortened to Dignity), the statue is dedicated to a group that is far too often overlooked: the women of the Lakota and Dakota Nations.

Sculptor Dale Lamphere used three Lakota women as models while designing the piece, which was installed in 2016. The statue features a traditional Plains-style outfit and holds behind her a wičháȟpi owíŋža, or star quilt. In Lakota culture, these quilts are gifts that often symbolize honor and generosity.

Sacagawea was still a teenager when she joined Merriwether Lewis and William Clark’s Corps of Discovery Expedition in February 1805. The young Lemhi Shoshone woman served as an interpreter and guide during the group’s journey, though her role went largely unrecognized through the 19th century. In a 1902 novel, Eva Emery Dye was the first to present Sacagawea as a significant member of the expedition. Soon, the Indigenous woman was adopted as a symbol within the women’s suffrage movement.

You'll find dozens of monuments to Sacagawea spread across the western United States, including one outside the Sacajawea Interpretive, Cultural, and Educational Center in the Lemhi River Valley—the ancestral lands of the Agai’dika Shoshone-Bannock people. Between Memorial Day and Labor Day, the center is open for visitors to explore the 70-acre park, see exhibits and artifacts, and visit the research library to learn more about Sacagawea's life.

Four tall pillars on the corner of Boren Avenue and Pike Street in Seattle once stood at the entrance of a church that has been supporting progressive movements for more than 150 years. In the late 19th century, the leaders of Plymouth Congregational Church denounced racism against Chinese immigrants, and in the early 20th century the church hosted the National American Woman Suffrage Association Convention. After the church was damaged in the 1965 Puget Sound earthquake, the marble columns were salvaged and installed in this small downtown park.

Just a short walk from Plymouth Pillars Park you can find Wildrose, one of the oldest lesbian bars in the country and an institution for the city’s LGBTQ+ community.

Some of the best roller derby in the United States can be found in an unassuming hangar at Portland’s Oaks Amusement Park. Established in 2004, Rose City Rollers is a women’s flat-track roller derby league. Members of the league’s four home teams compete in head-to-head bouts, skating under colorful pseudonyms like Sybil Disobedience, Pain Goodall, and Jaws 2: Lady Jaws.

If you want to get onto the track yourself, Rose City Rollers has a recreational league called Wreckers and offers introductory classes for beginners.

At Muir Woods, you can stroll through hundreds of acres of protected forest, including a large stand of old-growth coastal redwood trees. The largest redwoods here stand more than 250 feet tall and have been growing for more than 1,200 years. For this stunning piece of preserved habitat, you can thank Laura Lyon White and the California Club.

In 1904, the San Francisco-based women’s organization launched a campaign to preserve the old-growth forest in Redwood Canyon. Though they were unable to raise the necessary funds, their campaign inspired William and Elizabeth Thacher Kent to purchase the land, which President Theodore Roosevelt declared a national monument in 1908.

On the other side of San Francisco Bay, you can find a park that celebrates the estimated 18 million women who joined defense and support industries during World War II. It started with a memorial to Rosie the Riveter, the iconic bandanna-wearing figure representing women who took jobs in factories and shipyards while men were deployed.

In the years that followed, other parts of the former shipyard surrounding the memorial were preserved. In 2000, they officially became Rosie the Riveter WWII Home Front National Historical Park, which brings together stories of the women who kept the country running during times of war.

In 1979, a Bay Area nonprofit bought a four-story building in the city’s Mission District and turned the former Sons of Norway meeting hall into a woman-owned and operated community center that advocates for gender equality and social justice.

The bold, bright Maestrapeace Mural covering the exterior of the Women’s Building is a collaborative piece created by seven women artists. It features portraits of real women including painter Georgia O’Keefe, activist Rigoberta Menchu, and poet Audre Lorde, as well as feminine mythological figures from around the world. This vibrant mural celebrates the breadth of what women have accomplished, while reminding us that there’s still work to be done.