11 Sharp Women Born During February

A common trait – an unshakeable willpower and energy that catapulted them to fame – shines through in all of these unique February females.  After all, has there ever been anyone else in film like Elizabeth Taylor, whose extraordinary looks and life story seem inimitable?  Or another everyday-person-turned-public figure like Rosa Parks, who has so perfectly embodied a startling, steely grace when told to accommodate the status quo? So with their uncommon examples, and the extra day this month to reach your goals, use the inspiration from them to be productive and plan for the year ahead.

Ronda Rousey (born February 1, 1987)
Rousey was born to AnnMaria De Mars (the first U.S. citizen to win a gold medal at the World Judo Championship) and followed in her mother’s footsteps by pursuing martial arts at age eleven. She became the youngest judoka (practitioner of judo) at the 2004 Olympic Games when she was just seventeen. Then, at the Olympics in 2008, she won a medal in women’s judo, becoming the first American to win since it became an Olympic sport in 1992. Rousey then went on to find her passion practicing mixed martial arts and, in 2012, became the first female fighter to sign with the Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC).

Last year, Rousey was the third most- searched person on Google; UFC ranked her as the #1 female bantamweight fighter in the world; and she became their highest-paid fighter amongst both men and women. Her career accomplishments range beyond fighting, however — she is the author of My Fight, Your Fight, and has had roles in feature film: most recently, she was cast in the remake of the film Road House and confirmed her association with an upcoming Tina Fey comedy focused on women’s empowerment.

Words of Wisdom: “Once you start caring about people’s opinions of you, you give up control.”



Rosa Parks (February 4, 1913-October 24, 2005)
Heading home from work on the bus on December 1, 1955 in Montgomery, Alabama during the era of the segregated south, Parks refused to give up her seat to a white passenger. Though she wasn’t the first to disobey segregation laws, her act of defiance made history, symbolizing the Civil Rights Movement. To protest Parks’ arrest and trial, the Montgomery Bus Boycott was organized and approximately 40,000 African Americans refused to ride the bus.

Prior to her famous act, Parks had attended an education center in the summer of 1955 to learn about activism and racial equality, and was already involved in the Civil Rights Movement as the secretary for the NAACP. But it was her calm act of dignified disobedience that brought the black community together, and that led the way to the bulk of her civil rights work with E.D. Nixon and Martin Luther King, Jr.

Both she and her husband lost their jobs after the bus incident, and so Parks and he, along with her mother, left Alabama and went to live in Detroit, where she resided the remainder of her life. There, she worked as a receptionist to U.S. Representative John Conyers, and served on the Board of Planned Parenthood of America.  Throughout her lifetime, she received an incredible number of honors, awards, and memorials to mark her legacy.

Words of Wisdom: “Each person must live their life as a model for others.”



Emma Roberts (born February 10, 1991)
Born into the spotlight, Roberts was destined for the film industry. Her grandmother was Betty Lou Bredemus, an American actress and acting coach, who gave birth to Oscar-winner Julia Roberts, actress and producer Lisa Roberts Gillian, and actor Eric Roberts.  As a child, Roberts spent time on set with her famous aunt Julia. In her first audition, Roberts was cast in her debut film Blow, starring Penelope Cruz and Johnny Depp, at nine years old. By the time she was twelve she had a starring role on the Nickelodeon show Unfabulous.

Since then, her steady career performances in feature films — including comedy, thrillers, and dramas —  and TV series have been met with mixed reviews.  She was a Neutrogena brand ambassador and is currently filming Billionaire Boys Club with an all-star cast, including Ansel Elgort, Kevin Spacey and Taron Egerton. Later this year she will be seen in the drama thriller, Nerve, alongside Dave Franco.

Words of Wisdom: “When it comes to love, always be open.”



Jennifer Aniston (born February 11, 1969)
Though having successful television actor parents (John Aniston, in Days of our Lives and Nancy Dow, in The Beverly Hillbillies), Aniston carved out her own identity in Hollywood with her award-winning role in Friends.  Before making it big, however, Aniston starred in four failed television shows and worked several part-time jobs. Discouraged and depressed in Los Angeles, Aniston spoke with Warren Littlefield (a television executive) who reassured her and later helped her get cast in Friends. Subsequently,  during her success on TV, Aniston also appeared in a number of hit films. Her “girl next door” youthful beauty and diverse acting styles have made her a worldwide recognizable celebrity and one of the wealthiest women in entertainment.

She has also ventured into more dramatic, heavy-hitting roles, including 2014’s Cake, for which she received Screen Actors Guild and Golden Globe award nominations. Her upcoming ventures include the romantic comedy Mother’s Day, to be released in April, and a war drama, The Yellow Birds, with Jack Huston and Toni Collette, currently being filmed.

Words of Wisdom: “I always say don’t make plans, make options.”



Susan B. Anthony (February 15, 1820 – March 13, 1906)
A strong voice in the women’s suffrage movement during the nineteenth century, Susan B. Anthony is to thank for many of our freedoms today. Her lifelong devotion to equality started at a young age with her abolitionist and temperance advocate father encouraging her, alongside her brothers, to be free- thinking and self-supporting (a radical ideology at the time).

At age seventeen, she began collecting signatures for petitions on anti-slavery. She then became an outspoken campaigner who traveled around the country with an average of 75-100 speeches given a year, and alongside Elizabeth Cady Stanton, submitted an amendment to Congress for women’s right to vote. (It was introduced in 1878,  although didn’t enter the U.S. Constitution until 1920, after Anthony’s death.)

Public perception towards her started out in a negative light but gradually changed throughout her lifetime: in fact, her eightieth birthday was celebrated with President McKinley at the White House, and she was later honored on the U.S. 1979 dollar coin. Her legacy now consists of progressive opinions that were way before her time, and that presaged both the women’s empowerment movement of the 1970’s and today.

Words of Wisdom: “Cautious, careful people, always casting about to preserve their reputations, can never effect a reform.”



Cindy Crawford (born February 20, 1966)
Crawford’s rise to supermodel fame began as a junior in high school, when was approached by a local photographer in her home state of Illinois and asked to appear on the cover of the publication DeKalb Nite Weekly. The positive response to the finished photo led her to enter, at age seventeen, the “Look of the Year” contest held by Elite Model Management; she won runner-up.

Given that success, despite being a high school valedictorian and having a chemical engineering scholarship for Northwestern University, Crawford signed a contract with Elite for representation and began pursuing modeling full-time. Her extensive list of work includes everything from runway to magazine covers and music videos, and she was not only one of the most popular supermodels of the 1980s and 1990s, but became the highest-paid model worldwide in 1995.

Retiring from full-time work in 2000, Crawford now has a furniture line, provides celebrity endorsements, and stays involved in activism; a large part of her charity work throughout her career has been devoted to a cure for childhood leukemia, since her younger brother died of the disease when she was ten. Lastly, in September 2015, she co-wrote a book about her life, which became a New York Times bestseller, titled Becoming.

Words of Wisdom: “The face you have at age twenty-five is the face God gave you, but the face you have after age fifty is the face you’ve earned.”



Robyn Rihanna Fenty (born February 20, 1988)
Best known publically by her middle name, Rihanna, this multi-million-selling recording artist was born in Barbados and grew up listening to reggae music. She began singing at an early age and formed a trio band in high school, but dropped out to pursue her music career, which led her to being discovered by a record producer who was vacationing in Barbados. The two shared mutual friends, and after being impressed by her voice, he flew her to New York to record demo tapes.

After this quasi-fairytale beginning, she was signed to a six album record deal with Def Jam Records in 2005, and over the years has sold over 200 million records and accrued thirteen number one hit singles.  She also holds the record for being the female artist who has accrued the most number one singles in the shortest time (ten of them in less than five years).

In 2015, Rihanna became co-owner of the music streaming service, Tidal; became the first African American woman to be the face of Dior; and lent her voice to the animated film, Home.  She will be seen in the 2017 film release of Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets, directed by visually trend-setting director Luc Besson, as well as onstage in her “Anti World Tour.”

Words of Wisdom: “When a door closes you have two choices: give up, or keep going.”



Drew Barrymore (born February 22, 1975)
Barrymore was bound for a lifelong Hollywood career spawning from her decades of family legacy on stage and film, including that of her grandfather John Barrymore, the most well-known Shakespearian actor of his day (and with whom she shares the famous Barrymore nose and chin), as well as his movie actor siblings Ethel and Lionel.

Drew made her first appearance onscreen at just eleven months old, but her breakthrough role as a child actor was in the mega-hit 1982 film, E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial.  After her success as a child star, her career went south as she dealt with drugs, alcohol, and rehab, but she emerged from that to publish an autobiography at age fifteen.

At age twenty-two, she co-founded the production company Flower Films, which has released famous titles such as Charlie’s Angels, Donnie Darko, and He’s Just Not That Into You, among others. Though her teens were a rough period of struggle, she has transitioned into a prosperous adult actress: over her forty years of acting, she has won dozens of awards and received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.

In her personal life, after failed engagements and marriages, Barrymore settled down and married the son of former Chanel CEO, Will Kopelman in 2012, with whom she has two daughters.

Words of Wisdom: “In the end, some of your greatest pains, become your greatest strengths.”



Dakota Fanning (born February 23, 1994)
Fanning was raised in Georgia, where she acted in local plays as a young girl until her TV debut in a Tide commercial. Her first few roles were on ER, CSI, and The Ally McBeal show. She became a famous child actor in 2001, when, at age seven, she starred opposite Sean Pean in I Am Sam, for which she became the youngest nominee in the history of the Screen Actors Guild Awards.

Fanning continued to co-star in high-grossing films, working with big names such as Steven Spielberg, Robert De Niro, and Reese Witherspoon. In 2009, she added modeling to her resumé and appeared on the runway in New York fashion week. This year she will return to the big screen with two new movies, including American Pastoral, marking Ewan McGregor’s directorial debut.

Words of Wisdom: “I’ve always felt that you should never forget that you’re just a person. Even though you’re not like everyone else, you are just like everyone else.”



Emily Blunt (born February 23, 1983)
Blunt found acting at age seven when a teacher encouraged her to use it as a remedy for her problem with stuttering. She was discovered by an agent as a teenager while attending Hurtwood House, a private school known for its performing arts program. Her rave reviews for roles in British productions led the way to her Golden Globe-award winning performance in Gideon’s Daughter, a British television series.

Her American debut was in the hit film The Devil Wears Prada, alongside Meryl Streep and Anne Hathaway. Since then, her versatile acting ability has made her a successful Hollywood actress, appearing in genres ranging from action (Sicario) to comedy and musical (Into the Woods), in addition to winning her numerous nominations.

She has been married to The Office star John Krasiniski since 2009. The couple is expecting their second child later this year, and in September, she will star in The Girl on the Train, the movie of the fastest-selling adult debut novel ever.

Words of Wisdom: “People quit on jobs. They quit on marriages. They quit on school. There’s an immediacy of this day and age that doesn’t lend itself to being committed to anything.”

Elizabeth Taylor (February 27, 1932 – March 23, 2011)
A face from the Golden Age of of Hollywood, alongside Shirley Temple and Judy Garland, Taylor was a British-American actress who spent her life under close attention from the media. Though born in England, her family moved to Beverly Hills when Taylor was a child. Her big, bright blue (some say violet) eyes with double eyelashes brought her attention, and she was offered contracts from MGM and Universal studios. As a child she had a notable role in Lassie Come Home before starring in her first film at age twelve in National Velvet.

She continued to rise to fame, acting in numerous movies during her adolescent and adult years before her career slowed during the late 1970’s. Although a genuinely talented actress (she was nominated for five Oscars, and won twice, including for a powerhouse performance in 1966’s Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf), her other memorable claims to fame consisted of her extravagant lifestyle, dramatic  illnesses, and eight marriages, all but one of which ended in divorce.

In her later years she moved into stage and television roles, as well as getting heavily involved in HIV/AIDS activism. Taylor’s lifelong health problems took a toll on her, and she was eventually hospitalized from heart failure, from which she passed away in Los Angeles at age 79.

Words of Wisdom: “There are so many doors to be opened, and I’m not afraid to look behind them.”