Timothy Dexter made absurd investments that somehow panned out, wrote an entire memoir without a single piece of punctuation, and faked his own death just to see how he would be mourned.

Two years after Jack the Ripper murdered and mutilated five women in London, Mary Pearcey was found guilty of an eerily similar slaying.

A child of former slaves, Mary McLeod Bethune achieved the near-impossible when she became an advisor to five different U.S. Presidents in the Jim Crow era.

Loathed by British imperialists but beloved by the Iraqis, Gertrude Bell negotiated a sovereign Iraq — while opposing women’s suffrage in her own home country.

For nearly a decade in the mid-Victorian era, Mary Ann Cotton poisoned a string of her husbands for their insurance money as well as anyone else who got in her way — including 11 of her own children.

In 1851, an American editor named Amelia Bloomer wrote an article in support of female pantaloons — inspiring women to wear a controversial garment called "bloomers."

After the Revolutionary War, American soldiers told stories about a brave woman named Molly Pitcher who fought alongside them — but the truth is more complex.

Born a princess of the Yoruba people in West Africa, Sarah Forbes Bonetta was kidnapped by a rival king at an early age. Then in a twist of fate, she was taken to Victorian England.

As "Jane Roe," she fought for the right to choose in the landmark Roe v. Wade case. As Norma McCorvey, she later took money to push an anti-abortion agenda.

On July 22, 1939, Jane Bolin was sworn in as a judge in New York City. She would go on to serve in this position for the next 40 years.

Trained to be ruthless killers, Dahomey Amazons struck fear into the hearts of 19th-century colonizers. And though they were ultimately defeated, some survivors still got their revenge.