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A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O PQ R S T U V W XYZ

" noble deeds and hot baths are the best cures for depression"

English playwright ....  Dodie Smith  b 1896

HER NAME IS D...............

* Daisy Hyams

 ..... FIRST woman to be employed by the founder of Tesco's store, Sir John Cohen. Together they built his "Pile it High, Sell it Cheap" chain store empire. She remained with the company for 51 years and since 1965 was managing director of one of its subsidiaries

* Daniella Somers

..... FIRST Women's International Boxing Federation light welterweight champion in April 1995 when she was the surprise winner over Norway's more experienced Helga Risoy

* Danielle Haskell

..... Englishwoman who was the FIRST woman honorary member of the Normandy Veterans Association in August 1992. She was recognised for her courage and determination having been confined to a wheelchair for seven years due to a virus. She completed a 300-mile, two-week marathon push from Liverpool to Hull to raise money for charity

* Daphne Donaldson

..... FIRST woman President of the Association of Essex Philatelic Societies and the FIRST woman President of the Southend Philatelic Society (P/L)

* Daphne Kearley

..... Britain's FIRST air hostess when she joined Air Dispatch's Dawn Express service from Croydon to Le Bourget in 1936. She had to mix drinks, cook, speak French and be able to use a typewriter. During the 2½ hour flight  she was expected to take dictation from the business men on board and produce typed letters by the time they arrived at their destination. It was said that during her 10 months service she received 299 proposals

* Daphne Lidbeth

 ..... in 1982 she was the FIRST woman member of Gardner's Question Time

* Daphne Steele

 died 2004

..... the U.K's FIRST black Matron. She was born in Guyana and came to Britain in the 1950s. She rose through the ranks as a midwife at St Winifred's maternity hospital in Ilkley, West Yorkshire and was appointed matron in 1964

* Davina Thompson

 died 1998

..... she was the world's FIRST triple organ transplant patient when she received a new heart, lungs and liver in an operation at the Papworth Hospital, Cambridge in 1987

* Dawn Fraser

 born September 4th 1937

..... FIRST woman to swim the 100 metres and 110 yards in under one minute. Classed as one of the greatest freestyle swimmers she won four gold and four silver Olympic medals and set 20 world records during her career. She was the only one ever to win the same title at three successive Olympic Games.  In 1965 she was awarded the OBE 

* Dawn Skelton

..... one of the FIRST two recipients of a new fellowship scheme to encourage young, talented scientists to investigate the problems of ill health in later life. It was set up by the medical charity Research Into Ageing with the Queen Mother as its patron. The other recipient was Andrew Scutt and he was to do research into replacing bone loss due to osteoporosis whilst Dawn was to research an exercise programme to prevent falls

* Dawn Steel

 ..... on November 5th 1987 she became the FIRST woman President of Columbia Pictures

 * Dawn Trowsdale

..... FIRST woman to umpire a man's game of cricket at Lord's in 1985 when she was in charge of an indoor cricket match, a new Australian game played by eight-a-side teams for 90 minutes

* Dawn Wofford

 nee Palethorpe

..... FIRST woman chairman of the Pony Club  in its 61-year history when she assumed the role in 1990 for a two-year term

* Debbie Freeman

..... FIRST writer-in-residence at Manchester's police museum in Newton Street in 1998 where she will work with both adults and schoolchildren in a series of writing workshops on one day a week for a year

* Debbie Heesom

..... FIRST woman to be accepted by the Navy's 100-year old Royal Engineering College at Manadon, Plymouth

* Debbie McGee

..... FIRST woman to try to join the Magic Circle after it voted to abandon its male-only membership in 1991. She was the wife of the television magician Paul Daniels and began planning her application as soon as she heard that the Circle had voted to admit females

* Debbie Moore

 ..... FIRST woman director on the floor of the Stock Exchange in London when her Pineapple dance empire went public in 1982

* Debby Carr

 ..... FIRST ever Boddingtons girl

* Deborah Borda

..... American who was the FIRST woman to head a major orchestra in the U.S.A in 1996 . She did not conduct the orchestra herself, she just paid men to do it for her

* Deborah Camp-Simpson

..... FIRST British woman trainer of horses in France and the FIRST British woman to take and pass the rigorous exams , in French, for training - 1996

* Deborah Hickling

..... FIRST woman consultant at Wythenshawe Hospital in Manchester in 1995

  * Deborah McKinlay

 ..... Britain's FIRST agony aunt for men as a writer for Esquire magazine

* Deborah Sampson

..... the FIRST known American woman to join the army and take part in Combat ( all of which she did disguised as a man)

* Deborah Warner

 ..... FIRST woman to direct in the new Swan Theatre in Stratford

* Dee Dee Myers

.....  FIRST woman to be a press secretary to an American President when appointed by President Clinton

* Deirdre Beddoe

 ..... FIRST woman Professor of the Polytechnic of Wales in 1989

* Deirdre Patton

  born 1965

 ..... FIRST woman ever to be awarded the Maser Craftsman Certificate by the Dry Stone Wall Association - 1988

* Delia Smith

..... in 2002 she became one of the FIRST people to have a Collins Dictionary entry under her first name only. A 'Delia' is defined as - a recipe or style of cooking of British cookery writer Delia Smith

* Della Cannings

..... in 2002 she became the FIRST woman Chief Constable in the history of the North Yorkshire Police. She was one of only four women chief constables out of the UK's 44 police forces and the FIRST in the North

* Delma-Rose Yorath

 (Delma Palmer)

 ..... FIRST woman President of the Co-operative National Funeral Services Managers Association in 1993 and the FIRST woman President of the National Association of Co-operative Officials

* Demi-Lee Brennan

..... FIRST transplant patient to switch blood groups when the replacement liver she had been given made her body adopt the immune system of the organ's donor and her blood group changed from O-negative to O-positive

* Denise Moore

born 1876 died 21st July 1911

 ..... she was the FIRST female victim of fixed wing aviation when she had a fatal crash from 120 feet. She was born in Algiers and trained at the Farman school of Etampes in 1911. On that fateful day she ignored the instructions of others at the school that it was much too dangerous to fly and died in a wind gust. Her real married name was Jane Wright ( from Dave Lam)

* Denise Rose

..... Staff Sergeant who was the FIRST woman casualty of the British Army in Iraq in 2004

* Denise Rowley

..... in 1988 she was the FIRST woman regional director with the ECGD London after being involved with the department since leaving University in 1976. She trained as an underwriter before joining the department's London office and regarded herself very much as a career civil servant

* Detta O'Cathain

  Baroness

..... FIRST woman on the board at British Airways when appointed along with Charles Mackay by Sir Colin Marshall. She was a successful business woman who also sat on the boards of Tesco and Sears

* Devika Rani

 born March 30th 1908 died 1994

..... long considered the first lady of Indian cinema she was the star of the FIRST Indian 'talkie' film Karma in 1933 and the FIRST woman in India from a privileged background to join the vulgar world of cinema. With her first husband she founded Bombay Talkies in the 1930s, one of the FIRST and best-known film studios in 'Bollywood' and over the next twelve years made about 25 films

* Di Ellis

 ..... in 1998 she was the FIRST woman steward at Henley Royal Regatta

* Di Trevis

..... FIRST woman Associate Director of the National Theatre to run her own company. After a small scale touring production of Brecht's The Mother in the Autumn, she directed Moliere's School for Wives and Lorca's Yerma. Her assistant was Irina Brown

* Diana Brook

 ..... Englishwoman who was the FIRST woman to take charge of a major auction group

* Diana Scultori Ghisi

 ..... on June 5th 1575 she became the FIRST female artist to be given permission by Pope Gregory X111 to sign her own name on her engravings

 * Diana Goodman

..... FIRST female foreign correspondent for the BBC. She had been a general reporter with the BBC Radio News in London since 1982 and moved to Bonn on her new appointment

* Diana Moran

..... television's Green Goddess with her keep fit exercise programme. It was the FIRST time a cosmetic line had been introduced for the mature woman when she promoted Oil of Ulay

* Diana Nyad

..... on August 20th 1979 she staggered out of the sea at Juno Beach after becoming the FIRST woman to swim the 60 miles between the Bahamas and Florida. The crossing took her 27 hours and 41 minutes and it was estimated that because of strong currents she had swum a distance of nearer 89 miles

* Diana - Princess

..... FIRST woman in modern times to be awarded the Freedom of the City of Portsmouth - 1992 and in 1995 was the FIRST Royal in the 20th century to take the press to court

* Diana Rigg

..... FIRST Lady Chieftain of the Highland Games in its 141-years when appointed at Bridge of Allan, Central Scotland in August 1992 and in October 1998 was appointed FIRST woman Chancellor of Stirling University

* Diana Taylor

..... FIRST woman President of the British arm of the giant Inteflora group. She ran Crosbie's Florists in Prestwich, Manchester, England and reached the top of the world's leading flower relay organisation after 28 years as a member. During her two year term of office she had a casting vote on matters affecting the day-to-day running of the group's British section, which had a £60m turnover.  She also travelled to Antigua, Singapore, Japan and America to visit other Interflora units

* Diane Barnato Walker

died 2008

..... in 1963 she gained the women's unofficial speed record with 1262 mph in a Lightning aeroplane, the FIRST woman to fly one. She was also the FIRST woman to fly a Spitfire in France and was part of the Air Transport Auxiliary during WW2

* Diane Arbus

 born 1923 died 1971

..... FIRST American photographer to be exhibited at the Venice Bienale - 1972. After exhibiting at the Museum of Modern Art in 1967, along with two other photographers, her studies of outcasts, cripples and deviants turned her into a cult figure

* Diane Berry

..... on January 28th 1994 she became the FIRST British super-flyweight women's champion when she outpointed Welsh girl Petrina Phillips at Fleetwood's Marine Halls in the FIRST women-only boxing tournament to be held outside London

* Diane Cram

..... Britain's FIRST blind magistrate when she was appointed in 1998 after a four year campaign to prove that blind people can administer justice. A 1946 ruling had maintained that the blind should not be JPs on the grounds that they could not see a defendant's demeanour and Mrs Cram wrote to Lord Irvine asking him to reconsider the regulations

* Diane Modahl

 ..... FIRST British athlete to reverse a charge of drug abuse

* Diane Stenson

..... FIRST ever female producer of Gardner's Question Time on BBC radio. It is one of the longest running radio programmes in the world and has occupied the same slot on Radio 4 from when it began

* Diane Thorne

..... FIRST woman jockey to win under National Hunt rules - 7th February 1976

* Dianne Julie Abbott

  born September 27th 1953

..... FIRST black woman MP when elected to the seat for Hackney North and Stoke Newington for the Labour Party. She was also the FIRST black woman at Newnham College, Cambridge where she developed her political skills

* Dianne Feinstein

..... American who was the FIRST woman to run for the officer of Governor of California in 1990

* Dilys Cadwaladr

..... the FIRST woman to win the Bardic Crown at the Welsh National Eisteddfod

* Dimmie Fleming

  born 1911 died September 10th 1996

 ..... FIRST and only woman to have represented Britain at bridge in an open team

* Dinah Shurey

..... FIRST woman to direct a feature film in Britain - Carry On - 1927

* Dixie Chicks

..... FIRST country music artists to stage a concert at Madison Square Gardens - 2003

* Dixy Lee Ray

 born 1914

..... FIRST woman Governor of Washington in 1977 who also had a distinguished career as a scientist

* Dolly Gee

nee Chang Hor-gee

  who Americanised her name to Dorothy 'Dolly' Gee

  born 1897 died 1978

 ..... Chinese lady who was probably the FIRST woman banker in America, one of the foremost businesswomen in the country who was honoured and feted over the years as the pillar of the Chinese community in America's largest Chinatown. She was also one of the most spectacular embezzlers on record taking more than $300,000 over a fifty year period from San Francisco's Chinatown branch of the Bank of America

*Dolores 'Dodo' Lees

 born April 20th 1920 died 1991

..... one of the FIRST women to cross the Channel after D-Day and the only British nurse in the French army in WW2. She was twice awarded the Croix de Guerre for the Rhine and Danube campaigns and showed great courage for rescuing men under fire. Her birthday was the same date as Hitler's and he predicted that she would do well in British politics. However this was not so

* Dolores Rennie

..... in April 1944 she was one of the FIRST women to obtain the London bus drivers certificate. Although she could not drive on the road she was able to ferry buses between depots and manoeuvre them into place in garages

* Donna Hartley

..... dubbed the Golden Girl of British Athletics she was the FIRST woman to run in three Olympic Games. From 1972 to 1980 she was Britain's number one 400 metre runner

* Donna Manley

..... FIRST woman in the police force to make it onto the Fire Support Unit and the FIRST female officer in the force to become qualified - Greater Manchester

* Donna de Varona

 born 1947

..... American who was awarded the FIRST gold medal to a woman for the 400 metre individual medley (swimming) in 1964 in the Olympics

* Donna Weinbeck

..... winner of the FIRST ever Women's Moguls event in the Winter Olympics at Albertville in France in February 1992

* Dora Bantu

 born 1941

..... Tasmanian who was the FIRST woman Foreign Service Officer of Tanzania as Assistant Secretary to the Director for the Asian Government in 1963 after being given a scholarship in 1960 to study economics and political science at a Catholic Worker's College in England. In 1971 she was in China, in 1972-74 France, was director for Europe and the Americas in 1974 and in 1978 was appointed a Director of 'Air Tanzania' Co-operation Board

* Dora Bryan

..... FIRST ever female Dame in a pantomime when she appeared at the London Palladium in Jack and the Beanstalk with Frankie Howerd

* Dora Taylor

 born 1884 died 1973

..... FIRST woman in Great Britain to report a boxing match  when her article was featured in the Manchester Evening News on September 20th 1932. (P/L)

* Dora Walker

  born 1890 died 1980

..... FIRST woman fishing boat skipper on the north-east coast of England - Whitby

* Doreen Boulding

..... FIRST woman boss of a grand hotel in the Sheraton group of international hotels when appointed to the plush Belgravia Sheraton in London

* Doreen Ingrams

  born January 24th 1906 died 1997

..... FIRST European woman to penetrate many of the hidden towns and valleys of the Hadhramaut in Southern Arabia and founded the FIRST Bedouin girls school and a school for the blind

* Doreen Le Pichon

 ..... Englishwoman who in September 1995 was the FIRST woman judge in the High Court in Hong Kong

* Doris Coley

  born August 2nd 1941 died 2000

..... one of the all-girl group The Shirelles which, in 1958, was the FIRST girl group to have a single in the American Top 50

* Doris Coysh

 ..... in 1959 she was the FIRST woman umpire in cricket

* Doris Eastwood

..... FIRST woman to take the title of world-champion town crier at Wotton-Under-Edge, Gloucestershire when she out-shouted 20 male rivals in 1983/4. She was aged 52 at the time and came from Weymouth in Dorset

* Doris Jourd

  born 1896 died 1998

..... in 1908 she was the FIRST Girl Guide when her mother started the FIRST company in Gillingham in

Kent

* Doris Lessing

..... FIRST British woman to win the Nobel Prize for Literature - 2007. She was the eleventh woman to win

* Doris Lillian Taylor

  nee Smith

  born July 1900 died 1995

..... Canada's FIRST Wren when she became a member of the Canadian Women's Royal Naval Service in 1942. She eventually became one of the service's three highest-ranking officers

* Doris Thompson

..... in the 1920s she was the FIRST ever person to ride on the FIRST ever rollercoaster in Blackpool and also became Blackpool's FIRST female Freeman of the Borough

* Dorita Konyot

 born 1922 died 1997

..... equestrian circus performer whose Russian-born mother, a ballerina, was the FIRST woman to perform at the Spanish Riding School in Vienna

* Dorothea Beale

 born 1831 died 1906

..... FIRST residential training college for women teachers was opened by her in 1885 - St Hilda's College, Cheltenham, which moved to Oxford as St Hilda's Hall of Residence in 1893. She was a pioneer of women's education and became principal of Cheltenham Ladies College in 1858. Through her educational opportunities for girls improved

* Dorothea Christiane Erxleben

 born 1715 died 1762

..... FIRST woman medical doctor in Germany on June 12th 1754 when her graduation was authorised by King Frederick the Great who had previously allowed her and her brother to be admitted to the University of Halle in 1741. They had both studied Latin, basic science and medicine with their father who was a physician in Prussia. Her first book Rational Thoughts on Education of the Fairer Sex was published in 1749

* Dorothea Klumpke

..... American who was the FIRST woman to be allowed to work at the Paris Observatoire and the FIRST woman to gain a doctorate in mathematics there. She was also the FIRST woman elected to the Astronomical Society of France and in 1898 became the FIRST astronomer to ascend to study the stars from a balloon. She was working in Paris at the time. Her sister was Augusta Klumpke

* Dorothea Lynde Dix

  born 1802 died 1887

..... teacher and pioneer in American Prison Reforms and the creation of almshouses and insane asylums who opened the FIRST mental hospital in Trenton, New Jersey. Her Memorial to the Legislature of Massachusetts (1843) is her study of institution conditions and is an indictment of the conditions and treatment of the insane. This was followed by similar investigations and exposes in other states. According to her own estimate in three years she visited 18 state penitentiaries, 300 county jails and houses of correction and more than 500 almshouses and other institutions. She also visited hospitals and houses of refuge. When the Civil War broke out in America she volunteered for service and was appointed superintendent of nurses for the Union Army. She organized the recruitment and training of thousands of nurses and her development of the Army Nursing Corps greatly helped to legitimize women as health care providers

* Dorothea Payne Todd Madison

..... FIRST First Lady to accompany her husband at his inauguration as President in 1809

* Dorothy 

* Dorrit McKay

 nee Dorothea Ursula Noble

 born 10th November 1906 died 2000

 ..... breeder of whippets whose Champion Laguna Lucky Lad was the First whippet to win the hound group at Westminster in 1958, the American equivalent of Cruft's

* Duchesse d' Uzes

..... FIRST woman to pass the driving test in France in 1898 after satisfying the examiner of her ability to brave the hazards of the busy Bois de Boulogne

* Dusty Springfield

  born April 16th 1939 died 1999

..... among the FIRST British singers to champion the sound of black America and Motown. Her song 'I only want to be with you' was the FIRST song to be performed on the new television programme, Top of the Pops

* Dynamite - Ms

..... FIRST solo black female artist to win the prestigious Mercury Music Prize in London - September 2002

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