Our Story: Honoring Women, Empowering Girls

We started this project because we needed something positive to set our minds and hearts on these days. It started with a question from our 7-year-old Georgia, “Who was the first girl chemist?”.  We dove into research, Georgia was so excited about our discovery that she immediately put on her sister’s white shirt as a lab coat and started pretending to be Dr. Daly. She ‘played’ chemistry all day with her test tubes and beakers, taking our simple experiment and research well beyond the curriculum.

It was clear that she had made a personal connection with Dr. Daly’s accomplishments and life story. It was such a great opportunity to bring history to life and empower her as a young black girl. I took a few pictures, printed them with a little summary for her to keep. And just like that, we had the beginning of a personal homeschool curriculum for our daughter. Focusing on black women that have made history gives us an exciting direction. Our goal isn’t to make photographs that are exact copies of the women we find, our goal is to discover and connect with their lives. Our goal is to highlight their contributions to this world, to make their stories accessible to all women and girls that are in the process of creating their own history.

The most challenging piece of this adventure has been deciding who to feature. There are so many amazing African-American women, both past and present, that hold important stories. These strong, intelligent, brave, resourceful, talented women that have shaped the world around them. These barrier breakers, these trailblazers, these history makers. They fought sexism, injustice, and racism. They stood up and defied norms. They persisted, against all odds, to drive change.

Imagine if every little girl grew up learning about these extraordinary women, they would never doubt their place in the world or their own limitless possibilities. This is for her, this is Her Story.



About The Author


shaunaupp

Mother, Photographer, Wisecracker.... not necessarily in that order.

11 Comments

  1. This site is really wonderful! I was wondering if a physical book might come from this work? I would love to see a physical book get published. I would love to put a copy on my classroom bookshelf. If there is one I would appreciate that information.

    Thank you for this website!

  2. How amazing this is!! I have two little girls Tilly (6) and Quinn (8) and as a single parent, I’ve been teaching my daughters about all the amazing black women in history. Thank you so much for starting (and continuing) this great adventure! I have just one question for you and that is if Georgia is still doing this? My girls love your content and they miss it.

  3. I love, love, LOVE your site! I teach African American Literature and frequently point my students to your beautiful page. I hope you don’t mind if I give you a shout-out on Facebook? It is for my College’s Honors Academy page, honoring Black History Month.

    1. Thank you so much Ms. Julie for your support, your words of encouragement are giving us life! Please do share, our goal is for these women’s stories to be told and retold until they become part of our everyday knowledge!

  4. BLACK GIRLS ROCK!!
    I am doing research on Elizabeth Cotton the blues singer, and here is your website to give me the information that I need. Thank you so much … keep up the good work.

  5. What a wonderful website! I love all the hard work you and your daughter have put into it! I’m so glad Georgia enjoys black history month!

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