Historic, ‘Untold’ Stories To Take Spotlight at Needham Nonprofit

July 18, 2025
• As Massachusetts and the nation celebrate 250 years of independence, one Needham organization hopes to highlight the Revolutionary role of Bay State women.

When asked about notable historical women, Fredie Kay’s mind goes to the suffrage movement, populated by thousands of women who fought and were arrested for their advocacy. Boston, in fact, was the last place in the nation where women were jailed for the right to vote back in 1919.

Kay smiles when she shares that fact, flashing her mock “jailhouse door pin” those women and others earned for their activism.

Those stories and others will enter a soon-to-be Hall of Fame at Kay’s Massachusetts Women’s History Center, thanks in part to a $40,000 state grant awarded last month. The exhibit aims to feature notable past and living women, and its first inaugural class of historical figures will exclusively be women of the Revolutionary era.

That may include First Lady Abigail Adams, who famously urged her husband to “remember the ladies,” and Paul Revere’s wife Rachel Revere, who cared for 14 children.

But Kay noted that, through their research, they hope to find lesser-known women, such as Massachusetts native Deborah Sampson, who dressed as a man to fight in the Revolutionary War, and Elizabeth Freeman, a formerly enslaved woman who successfully sued the state for her freedom and eventually all other Massachusetts residents.

“Part of our effort is to unearth many more women who we may not know about,” Kay said, “because we certainly think about the men, and not always about the women.”

Kay, who lives in Needham, founded the Massachusetts Women’s History Center in 2010, then called Suffrage100MA, which recognized the 90th anniversary of the 19th Amendment. The nonprofit recently rebranded to continue its mission to educate and advocate for women’s equity. Their selection committee just opened nominations to the public for its Hall of Fame, which will stay open until Sept. 25.

The Massachusetts 250 initiative is hosting events and programming in celebration of the state’s role in the American Revolution, as next year marks the semiquincentennial of Independence Day. The state campaign awarded $2 million in grants to the MWHC and 58 other groups across the state this fiscal year.

Sheila Green, coordinator of MA250 with the Office of Travel and Tourism, said that funding will help “elevate their untold or little-known stories.” The MWHC, in Green’s view, “has done a wonderful job at keeping women’s history alive.”

“We want to highlight the many firsts out of Massachusetts from the last 250 years, and we want to engage the public in a deeper understanding of Massachusetts’ revolutionary legacy and our history that really became the founding of America,” Green said.

MA250 previously awarded $1.5 million to organizations last fall. The grant will be reimbursed to the MWHC upon completion of their Hall of Fame project. They have until July 31 of next year to do so.

The center is currently a virtual museum with dreams of opening a physical space somewhere on the Freedom Trail or near the State House, Kay said.

Hall of Fame nominees must have a clear impact in their field, a significant connection to Massachusetts and provide an inspiration, particularly for women and young girls. For the first iteration, historical women must be born or established prior to 1776.

Massachusetts women often filled important behind-the-scenes jobs — such as creating soldiers’ uniforms, influencing policy and fighting for liberty off the battlefield — though failed to receive their due in the history books, Kay said. She thinks back to the suffragettes and Sarah Well of Worcester, who refused to pay her taxes in the 1800s because it was taxation without representation.

Dating back to the Revolution, and before and after, women made their mark on the state, the zeitgeist and enduring culture.

“These are core values that I think we have to heighten and highlight and remember what we fought for,” Kay said. “We fought, frankly, for the vote and to elect our own people, and I do hope that highlighting this will amplify to people the importance of their vote, what it took to get it and to use it.”

As the MWHC develops its first inductees to the Hall of Fame, Green said she and MA250 look forward to seeing the center and other programs that develop out of the grants.

“I think this is a really wonderful opportunity… to tell all these stories of these wonderful women who have done so much to support their husbands who were going to battle or building their families or keeping the farm, or whatever it is,” Green said of the MWHC, “and I think today we still can celebrate all the women and the innovations and the history of Massachusetts from the last 250 years, and all the many firsts that have come from Massachusetts.”