In addition to creating the test for newborn babies that is named for her, Apgar was a trailblazer other ways: She was one of four women accepted into Columbia’s medical school in 1929, and, while she was initially interested in pursuing a surgical residency, the chair of surgery at Columbia discouraged her from pursuing that field, and encouraged her to enter anesthesiology instead. She did so and, at 29, she became the sole practicing anesthetist at Columbia until the mid-1940s. And yet, when her division was upgraded to a department, she was passed over for the chair position in favor of a male colleague.

The first thing you should know about Mother’s Day is that its founder hated it. And Jarvis spent the rest of her life rebelling against the commercialization of “her” holiday by floral, candy, and greeting-card companies. “I want to tell you that you are using a beautiful idea as a means of profiteering,” she said upon crashing the Associated Retail Confectioners convention in Philadelphia in 1923.

Many linguists I spoke to stressed that changing a language doesn’t guarantee a change in perception; this leads some of them to say that inclusive writing just isn’t worth the trouble. But at least one major school of linguistic thought concludes that language and perception are intimately related.