Originally conceived as a ‘clubhouse’ to centralize campus life, the Michigan Union opened its doors to students in 1907 – with one key caveat. For decades, women were barred from entering through the front door.

Elizabeth Farrand — historian, university librarian, and physician — was among U-M’s most accomplished graduates of the 1800s, despite the unpleasant and ‘trifling matter’ of being considered eccentric by her male counterparts.

As a field geologist, 98-year-old Helen Foster, BA ’42/PhD ’46, mapped the farthest-flung islands of Japan, met Emperor Hirohito, and documented Alaska’s landscape.

Alumnae from the 1920s through the 1960s share tales of the ‘good old days,’ as current women describe their U-M experience.

As a scientist in the late ’60s, Rowena Matthews, PhD ’69, redefined gender norms in the lab. And that was before she hit the airwaves.