Here’s our selection of five women revolutionary in industries where women are still under-represented.
Harriet Tracy
Born in 1834, Tracy’s inventions were innovative and she patented them ruthlessly. It is recorded that she patented some impressive twenty-seven inventions during her lifetime. Eleven of those patents were for inventions related to lifts and included her invention for automatic hatchway guards. For her work, she received a letter highly commending her signed by five talented and world-famous engineers of the time.
Henrietta Vansittart
Vansittart, born in London in 1833 was a prolific engineer playing a part in the industrial revolution. Daughter of the inventor, James Lowe, the experimental inventor – Lowe created propeller designs which were trialled in the navy. After her father died, Henrietta succeeded his inventions and created the “Lowe-Vansittart propeller.” The propeller took off and she gained notoriety as “a remarkable personage with a great knowledge of engineering matters and considerable versatility of talent”.
Margaret Conway
Back in 2017, Conway won the esteemed award from the Chartered Institute of Building (CIOB) when she was named “Construction Manager of the Year.” She managed the titanic project to build Belfast City Council’s new headquarters. The £22m project was completed under budget, two months before the deadline. She was also the first woman ever to don the prestigious award!
Judith Ledeboer
Ledeboer was born in the Netherlands and was an active architect in London until 1990. She designed schools, housing for the state, and universities. Taking inspiration from the prominent female architect, Elisabeth Scott (who helped to build The Royal Shakespeare Theatre), Ledeboer’s courage to speak up in the post-war state housing policies and her architectural talent won her a well-earned OBE.
Emilie du Chatelet
In 1706 in France, Emilie du Chatelet was born. Little did the world know she would become an unstoppable force in learning languages, maths, physics and more and would translate Newton’s book on the laws of physics – ‘Principa’. Her advanced theories of energy helped to develop Newton’s concepts and gain headway for the way we understand physics today.