Inspirational Activists You Won’t Learn About in School

By Allie Firestone, originally published on DivineCaroline.com, January 2009.

[The popularity] of the movie Milk, starring Sean Penn, made me wonder why I never learned Harvey Milk's story in classroom discussions of civil rights, especially considering I grew up in San Francisco, where Milk [pictured at right] carried out his work. As a result, I started searching for other activists who have changed our world, but have been left out of the usual history lesson. These people have made great strides toward gender equality, women's liberation and civil rights. Without them, the world wouldn’t be what it is today.

Fred Shuttlesworth: Champion for Civil Rights

After Alabama outlawed the NAACP in 1956, this Baptist minister founded the Alabama Christian Movement for Human Rights, announcing that he would act out against all segregation laws. He led sit-ins, boycotts, and strikes, and his work in Alabama was a major force in pressuring Congress to overturn segregation. He fought against violent racism with peaceful activism — white supremacists bombed his house multiple times, a white mob beat him with whips and chains and, after his leadership during the mass protests in Birmingham, he was slammed against a wall by high-pressure fire hoses. He later became one of the first officers in Dr. Martin Luther King’s Southern Christian Leadership Conference and King described him as "one of the nation’s most courageous freedom fighters." Still alive today, Shuttlesworth is a pastor and directs the Shuttlesworth Housing Foundation, an organization that helps low-income families purchase homes.

Del Martin and Phyllis Lyon: Challenging the Norm

In 1955, Del Martin and Phyllis Lyon co-founded Daughters of Bilitis, the first national lesbian organization (named after a fictional lover of Sappho — the famously lesbian Greek poet). In 1964, they helped start the Council on Religion and the Homosexual, a group that sought to join religious leaders and gay activists to discuss marriage equality. Martin aided in the successful campaign for the American Psychiatric Association to take homosexuality off its list of mental illnesses. Meanwhile, Lyon became the first openly gay woman on the National Organization for Women’s board in the ’70s. They also co-wrote two books, Lesbian/Woman and Lesbian Love and Liberation, during the same decade. Four years ago they were the first of thousands of couples married in San Francisco when Mayor Newsom began allowing gay marriage, though it was suspended a month later by the Supreme Court. They were able to marry again in 2008 after the court ruled in favor of marriage equality, but Martin passed away only two months later.



Margaret Sanger: Reproductive Rights Trailblazer

A lifelong crusader for reproductive rights, as a midwife Sanger had witnessed women —  including her own mother — worn out and deprived of the ability to care for their already born children. Contraceptives were illegal, so only the rich and educated had the ability to circumvent the law and buy European devices, like condoms. In protest, Sanger opened the country's first birth control clinic in Brooklyn, though ten days later it was shut down and she was arrested. She continued to fight for the right to birth control and eventually won the court's support. She opened another clinic in 1923 and later founded the American Birth Control League, which evolved into what is now Planned Parenthood. She fought to give women the right to control their own bodies, instead of being controlled by laws and legislators.

Karl Heinrich Ulrichs: Striving for Equality

Born in 19th century Germany, Ulrichs was one of the first champions of gay equality. Being openly gay was virtually unheard of at the time, but after completing a degree in law and theology, he went on to become a political figure and vocal activist for the freedom and equality of homosexuals. Despite severe prejudice, he was the first modern European male to publicly acknowledge and defend his right to be a homosexual. He published twelve pamphlets defending homosexual love and tried to develop a scientific theory to account for certain people’s inherent tendency toward homosexuality. Despite his courage, even devoted followers were reluctant to support him amid rampant homophobia. Because of this and a lack of financial resources, he went into self-imposed exile in the Italian countryside for the rest of his life.

Meena: Advocate for Women’s Rights

Meena launched Afghanistan’s first women’s rights movement in 1977 at the age of twenty. She named her activist organization the Revolutionary Association for the Women of Afghanistan (RAWA) and it’s still in existence today. As the organization’s leader, she fought for the restoration of democracy, equal rights, and the separation of religion from government to give voice back to the country’s silenced women. She organized processions and meetings against the Russian-backed government and launched a magazine, Payam-e-Zan, meaning “women’s message.” She established schools for refugee woman and children, and was honored throughout Western Europe for her work toward human rights. Her public affront to the ways of the Afghani government provoked her detractors and in 1987, ten years after founding RAWA, she was kidnapped and killed in Pakistan. Her work for women’s rights is still in motion today. The recent election of women into the country’s parliament is largely thanks to her work.



Elaine Noble: Fighting for Gay Rights

The first openly lesbian woman to hold political office in the U.S., Noble was elected to the House in 1974 from Massachusetts. Her victory helped set the stage for future gay politicians like Harvey Milk, who was elected to office in San Francisco three years later. She began speaking publicly about gay equality and women's rights in the early 1970s and was involved with a local radio program in Boston, Gay Way. Even as an elected official, she was the victim of prejudice — she was spit on, her life was threatened and she received bomb threats. In 1976, she was reelected for a second term. After serving in Congress, she co-founded a drug and alcohol treatment center in Minneapolis. Noble is still alive today.

Hector García: Working to Defeat Discrimination

As a child, Garcia fled Mexico for Texas, where he earned a degree from the University of Texas and became a doctor. He then joined the army and attained the rank of major. Outraged by the rampant discrimination against Mexican Americans, he returned to Texas and began speaking publicly against segregation. When a fellow soldier from his hometown died in service, his family was denied use of the local funeral chapel because of their race. Incensed, he wrote a letter to then-Senator Lyndon Johnson asking for intervention. He garnered attention from the national media and, because of the largely negative press that the state received for it, Garcia and his family received many threats and insults. As Garcia began to organize a protest of over 1,000 people, he received a telegram from Senator Johnson, granting the family access to the chapel. Garcia went on to lead protests for desegregation, appointing Mexican Americans to political and city offices, and was a champion for quality education and health care for all. President Johnson later appointed him alternate ambassador to the United Nations, and he was the first member of the U.S. delegation to address the general assembly in a language other than English when he spoke in Spanish about nuclear weapons in Latin America. He died in 1996.



Deborah Sampson: Breaking Down Barriers

Sampson is the first known American woman to pose as a man to join the army, which she did during the Revolutionary War. She bound her breasts, and with her tall-at-the-time 5'7" frame, she passed as a boy who hadn't quite started growing his facial hair. She injured her leg in battle, but tended her own wound to keep her gender a secret and as a result, the injury never fully healed. Later, she became ill and was hospitalized in Philadelphia, where her doctor quickly discovered her secret, so she ended her service. The military never found out and in 1783, General Henry Knox honorably discharged her. She returned to her hometown, married, became a mother and taught at a local school. Nine years later the state awarded her a small pension after Paul Revere sent a letter to Congress on her behalf. She traveled around speaking about her experience in the war, and after her death, her children were awarded special compensation from the government for her service.

Beyond those (very worthy) heroes we learn about in history lessons — MLK, Susan B. Anthony, Cesar Chavez — hearing these diverse voices — male and female, black and white, Christian and Muslim, gay and straight — reminded me we all have the power to make change in our world, wherever we see inequality. These are only a handful of the multitudes that have given all of us the rights I know I often take for granted. This year, I’m going to keep them in mind and try to honor their contributions, making the world a better place for everyone around me, even if it’s only one little step at a time.

Photo of Harvey Milk by Daniel Nicoletta, courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.

Photo of Meena from Rawa.org, courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.

Photo of Margaret Sanger by Underwood and Underwood for the National Library of Congress, courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.