#SoloLives is our feature in which we look at notable single women in history.

Dorothy Height was an American civil rights activist. Here are three facts about her:

In her seven decades of activism, she led the National Council of Negro Women, helped found the National Women’s Political Caucus and organized the 1963 March on Washington. She was an adviser to political leaders and fought against lynching and for stronger voter registration laws.
When she received the Presidential Medal of Freedom, President Obama called her “the godmother of the civil rights movement and a hero to so many Americans.”
Writer Robin Caldwell noted, “Dorothy Height died childless, having never married. To some women that would be a sin and a shame. To me and countless others who appreciated her presence as a civil-rights activist and women’s ‘club’ movement leader, she died leaving a multitude of daughters.” (We found this quote in “All the Single Ladies: Unmarried Women and the Rise of an Independent Nation” by Rebecca Traister.)