Shirley Chisholm

Shirley Anita St. Hill was born on the thirtieth of November 1924 in Brooklyn, New York, the daughter of Caribbean immigrants — her mother, Ruby Seale, of Barbados, and her father, Charles St. Hill, of British Guiana by way of Barbados. She spent part of her childhood on her grandmother's farm in Barbados, and carried its cadences and its discipline all her life. She earned her bachelor's degree from Brooklyn College in 1946 and her master's in childhood education from Teachers College, Columbia University, in 1951, building a first career as a teacher and director of child-care centers.

Politics called her from the classroom to the arena. In 1964 she won a seat in the New York State Assembly, and in 1968 she made history as the first Black woman ever elected to the United States Congress, representing New York's twelfth district, anchored in Bedford-Stuyvesant. She served seven terms, from 1969 to 1983, under a banner that became her creed: "Unbought and Unbossed."

In 1972 she reached higher still, becoming the first Black candidate to seek a major party's nomination for President of the United States and the first woman to contend for the Democratic nomination. In Congress she fought to expand food and nutrition programs for the poor, championed the rights of women, workers, and the marginalized, and helped found both the Congressional Black Caucus and the National Women's Political Caucus.

After leaving office she taught at Mount Holyoke College and remained a mentor to a rising generation. She died on the first of January 2005 in Ormond Beach, Florida, and was posthumously awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2015. She opened doors that no one had walked through before, and left them open for all who followed.