LADY AUGUSTA GREGORY Lady Augusta Gregory was born in County Galway, Ireland in 1852. She was a dramatist, folklorist, and theatre manager. Her legacies include her translations of Irish legends, being a playwright of comedies and fantasies, and the foundation of the Irish Literary Theatre and the Abbey Theatre, having written numerous pieces for both companies of which many are still performed to this day. ROSALIND FRANKLIN Rosalind Franklin was born in London in 1920. She made a significant contribution to the scientific world in numerous ways. Franklin excelled in X-ray crystallography, and despite a career cut short by a lost battle to cancer at the age of 37, she has made significant contributions to science - her studies led to uncovering the structure of DNA. Her later work revealed the structure of RNA viruses, including early work on the Polio virus. Discoveries in both areas contributed to the awarding of Nobel prizes after her death, though not to her (they cannot be awarded posthumously). While her name is often connected with missing out on a Nobel prize, her legacy is of much greater significance. ADA LOVELACE Augusta Ada King, Countess of Lovelace was born in London in 1815 to Lord and Lady Byron. She was an English mathematician and writer, known for the work she did on Charles Babbage’s general-purpose computer, The Analytical Engine. Lovelace discovered that the machine was able to process more than just pure calculation, and she also published the original algorithm intended for the machine. This led to her often being regarded as the first computer programmer. MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT Mary Wollstonecraft was born in 1759 in London. She was a passionate advocate for women’s rights, a writer, and a philosopher. Wollstonecraft is best known for A Vindication of the Rights of Woman (1792), arguing that women are not naturally inferior to men but only appear that way due to lack of education - a radical idea in her time. She passed away shortly after giving birth to her second daughter Mary Shelley, who would become an accomplished writer and author of Frankenstein.
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