National Women’s Hall of Fame announces 2017 inductees
A “Stranger Things” actress, a former US congresswoman and a geneticist are among the group of 10 that will be inducted into the National Women's Hall of Fame in 2017.
The women will be inducted in September during a ceremony in Seneca Falls, the location of the first women's rights convention. The hall of fame opened in the upstate New York town in 1969 and has so far recognised 266 women for their contributions in the fields of arts, athletics, business, education, government, humanities, philanthropy and science.
This year’s inductees include “A Raisin in the Sun” author Lorraine Hansberry; former first lady of New York state Matilda Raffa Cuomo; and animal scientist and autism advocate Temple Grandin.
They will be joined by Carol Mutter, the first woman Marine three-star general; Aimée Mullins, who stars in the Netflix series “Stranger Things”; former journalist and US Representative Clare Boothe Luce of Connecticut; entrepreneur Victoria Jackson; Sherry Lansing, the first woman to head a major film studio; geneticist Janet Rowley, and Alice Waters, a chef and restaurateur.
“We are pleased to add ten American women to the ranks of inductees whose leadership and achievements have changed the course of American history,” said the Hall’s co-president Betty Bayer in a statement.
The induction ceremony takes place every other year.
All but three in this year's group of inductees are still alive. Hansberry, the first black playwright to receive the New York Drama Critics' Circle Award for best American play, died in 1965. Luce, a former editor-in-chief of Vanity Fair and war correspondent, died in 1987. Rowley, whose research established that some cancers are genetic diseases, died in 2013.
Past inductees include former US Secretary of State Madeleine Albright; poet and civil rights advocate Maya Angelou; and US Supreme Court justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg.
Women are nominated by the public.