* Mabel Lucie Attwell

 born 1879

..... FIRST successful woman artist in Britain as an illustrator of  many of the well-loved fairy tales of the day with her sketches of fairies, goblins and dimpled children

* Mabel Bryant

..... in August 1901 she made the FIRST double century in women's cricket at Eastbourne

* Mabel Howard

 born 1893 died 1972

..... FIRST woman Cabinet Minister in New Zealand and the Commonwealth when made Minister of Health and Child Welfare (1947-49) by the FIRST Labour government. Although not a strict feminist she nevertheless fought for the rights of women and children

* Mabel Normand

 born 1894 died 1930

..... FIRST great screen comedienne who helped to introduce the custard pie and the Keystone Cops to the screen. Her love affair with Mack Sennet (founder of the Keystone Film company) became the basis of a Broadway musical in 1974- Mack and Mable. Scandals wrecked her career and she died at an early age - a great and unique talent lost to the sound cinema

* Mabel Walker Willenbrandt

 born 1896 died 1963

..... although the second woman to become Attorney General in America (see Janet Reno ) she was the FIRST to hold it for an extended term

* MacKenzie - Miss

..... FIRST matron of Manchester Royal Infirmary (UK), she was trained by Florence Nightingale

* Madame X

..... an unnamed French woman who was the FIRST to be diagnosed with Capgras syndrome by the psychiatrist Joseph Capgras in 1923. She could recognise her family but believed that imposters had replaced them

* Madeleine Albright

..... FIRST woman Secretary of State in America when nominated by President Clinton in 1996. It also made her the highest-ranking woman in US government history. She was also the FIRST US Ambassador to the UN to have been born outside the USA

* Madeleine Carroll

 born 26th February 1906

..... FIRST British actress to become a major star both in England and America. She was born in West Bromwich, Staffordshire as Marie Madeleine Bernadette 0'Carroll and made her first film The Guns of Loos in 1928. Other films followed in rapid succession. Her great Hitchcock films were The 39 Steps and Secret Agent and she is fondly remembered as Hitchcock's prototype "icy blonde heroine . She was one of the most popular female stars in the early 193Os and had no trouble at all in maintaining star status in America. Her major American period was with films such as The General Died at Dawn and a musical On the Avenue. Her finest dramatic role was in My Son, My Son and in 1942 she starred in a comedy with Bob Hope, My Favourite Blonde. She stopped working in 1964 and went to live on a farm near Paris where she grew apples

* Madeleine Pelletier

 born 1874 died 1939

..... one of the FIRST women freemasons and the FIRST woman allowed to qualify to work in mental hospitals. She joined the suffrage movement in the late 1890s and was a militant campaigner. She was secretary of several groups and tried to win the full backing of the Communists for women suffrage. In 1910 she was a candidate for the Parti Feministe of La Solidarite in the campaigns for the National Assembly but received very few votes. Towards the end of her life she campaigned for women's rights, birth control and legalized abortion and openly practised abortions herself until her arrest in 1939, even though she was partially paralysed by a stroke in 1937. She was ordered to be interned in an asylum and her physical and mental rapidly deteriorated and she died within the year

* Madeleine Vionnet

 born 1876 died 1975

..... FIRST couturier to cut women's clothes on the bias and the FIRST to use crepe-de-chine as a fabric and not a lining. She became famous for her lingerie in the first ten years of the 20th century and later created her own models for the Doucet fashion house. In 1914 she opened her own fashion house which was the most important in Paris in the years between the two world wars

* Madeleine Weightman, Polly Grint, Emma Leask and Sarah Ellis

..... four of the FIRST girls to be accepted for Oundle School, founded in 1485, when it went co-educational in 1990

* Madge Mackenzie

..... FIRST woman to form an all-woman film crew

* Madge Mortimer

 born August 5th 1912

..... FIRST woman member of the National Association of Retired Police Officers Executive Committee from April 1971 until April 1991. (P/L)

* Madge Syers-Cave

 neé Florence Madelaine

 born 1881 died 1917

..... Britain's FIRST Olympic skating champion and  the sole reason that the International Skating Union instigated a women's world championship in 1906

* Madonna

neé Louise Veronica Ciccone

born 1958

..... her website is the FIRST ever to launch an on-line mobile phone shop, making it possible for ring-tones and screensavers to be downloaded

* Mae Jemison

born 1956

.....  she was chosen from nearly 2000 applicants as one of the 15 members of NASA's 1987 astronaut-training program and in August 1988 completed a one-year training and evaluation program and became the world's FIRST black female astronaut. In 1992 she travelled into space on Space LabJ a mission which was a co-operative venture between the United States and Japan and focused on research in life sciences and material development

* Mae West

 born August 17th 1892 died November 22nd 1980

..... legendary star of the cinema whose name is the FIRST name of the many famous women stars which ended up in a dictionary when her name was given to the famous inflatable life jacket. She was one of the very first feminists and a trail blazer for to-days women's movements. In her late 80s she said " I was an original. There'd never been anybody like me before" and was famous throughout her career for her innuendos and wisecracks. More than a movie star she was an institution and also wrote. She changed the place of women in society , refused to be at the beck and call of men, wrote her own lines and ordered producers and directors around

* Maggie Gee

..... FIRST female chair of the Royal Society of Literature

* Maggie Hamand

..... FIRST winner of the One Day Novel Cup in 1994 with her novel The Resurrection of the Body, a 23,000 word, 68-page story which had taken her two 12-hours shifts to write

* Maggie Jencks

neé Margaret Keswick

born October 10th 1941 died 1995

..... author of Chinese Gardens (1978) the standard work on the subject and a notable designer herself. Through the Keswick Foundation she created the FIRST hospital for the terminally ill in Hong Kong after becoming ill with cancer herself and wanted to build a place where patients could sit in a quiet soothing environment

* Maggie Stagg

..... FIRST woman Deputy leader of Leicester City Council in 1988 where she was one of only three women in the ruling Labour group. She became active in politics through her work in the community including her work as a school governess

* Mandy Ainsworth, Linda McDonald & Sharon Hesketh

 neé Norah Marjorie Cobb

 born March 18th 1899 died 1991

..... English toy-maker who pioneered the concept of learning through play and whose toyshop was the FIRST to break the mould of the commercial counter display by encouraging children to touch and play with the toys on display at the shop in Wimpole Street , London , which was opened in the 1930s and which she ran with her husband

* Marjorie Craddock

neé Lloyd

..... FIRST woman reporter on the staff of the Manchester Evening News newspaper

* Marjorie Elaine Foster

 born 1893 died 1974

..... FIRST woman to reach the King's Hundred and the FIRST woman to win the King's Prize which was founded in 1860 by Queen Victoria and until her death was known as the Queen's Prize. It is the highest and most coveted individual award at the annual meeting of the National Rifle Association at Bisley and is open to all members, past or present, of H.M. Forces throughout the British Empire. Miss Foster, of the Women's Legion, won it in 1930. She joined the South London Rifle club in the early 192Os because it was the only one to admit women and won the club championship four times

* Marjorie Griffiths

..... charity campaigner who was the FIRST woman to be made a Freeman of Warrington. Former head of a girls school she was aged 82 at the time and had already received an MBE for her charity work for multiple sclerosis sufferers. She served for more than 20 years as a magistrate and was on the Community Health Council for 14 years

* Marjorie Hoggard

..... FIRST person in Britain to he electronically tagged for her own protection in 1989. She was 77 years old at the time and had senile dementia. Devices in her shoes triggered a doormat sensor if by chance she wandered away

* Marjorie Jackson

 born 1931

..... FIRST Australian woman athlete of undoubted world class (sprinter)

* Marjorie Fine Knowles

..... FIRST Inspector General of the Department of Labour

* Marjorie Pollard

 born 1899 died 1985

..... pioneer of women's sports in Britain and one of the FIRST women sports journalists when she wrote for the Morning Post, Observer, The Times and The Guardian and edited Hockey Field and Women's Cricket which was the FIRST publication devoted exclusively to the women's game and which first appeared in May 1930. In 1937 she was the FIRST woman radio commentator on cricket when she covered women's Tests for the BBC

* Marjorie Scardino

..... American who was the FIRST female chief executive of a FTSE 100 company. She was born in Arizona and read psychology and French at university in Texas. She switched to law with the intention of entering politics but ended up as a trainee reporter at Associated Press where she met her future husband. After a series of unsuccessful business ventures she was offered a job in charge of the Economist's American operation. She was soon appointed to run the entire Economist group and moved to London with her family. In four years she was running the whole of Pearson which part-owned the Economist and was voted 'Britain's most powerful woman'. Within three years Pearson's share price had trebled and the company was worth £15 billion. In April 2000 she unveiled a £12 billion merger between Pearson's television subsidiary and CLT Ufa, a Luxembourg-based broadcasting group whose 22 channels were watched by a daily audience of 120 million

* Marjorie Stephenson

born 1885 died 1948

..... English microbiologist and biochemist known for her work on microbial metabolism. In 1945 she was one of the FIRST two women elected to Fellowship of the Royal Society  ( see Kathleen Lonsdale)

* Marlene Louis

 ..... FIRST woman boxing manager

* Marlene Thomas

..... Wales's FIRST representative on the new European Women's Lobby in 1990 which was set up to provide a forum for women's interests in the European Community and each EC member state was allowed four representatives. Marlene was chosen by the Wales Women's Euro Network, an alliance of 50 national and local women's organisations

* Marlies Gohr

 born 1958

..... FIRST woman to run the 100 metres in under 11 seconds

* Marta Andreasen

..... in January 2002 she was the FIRST ever qualified accountant to be appointed as the European Commissions accounting officer, one of the highest-ranking budget officials in the EU

* Marta Tuyet Dodd

..... FIRST Vietnamese American to be selected as a recruiting poster for the United States armed forces

* Martha

* Marti Caine

 neé Lynne Denise Shepherd

 born January 26th 1945 died 1995

..... FIRST woman "stand-up" comic to break into television via the New Faces Show in 1975. She was the FIRST actress to play the part of Fanny Brice in The Pyjama Game with a Yorkshire accent

* Martina Navratilova

 ..... in 1987 she became the FIRST woman to win six consecutive Wimbledon singles championships and in 1990 became the FIRST to win a total of nine times

* Martine Le Moighan

..... FIRST Briton to win the Women's World Squash Rackets Championship in 1989  when she beat Susan Devoy, the defending champion from Auckland, New Zealand

* Mary

* Masoumeh Bolaghi

..... in November 2002 she became the FIRST woman bus driver in Iran. Since 1979 women had to sit at the back of the bus and men at the front but with her appointment this was reversed on her bus

* Massouma al-Mubarak

 ..... FIRST woman cabinet minister in Kuwait - 2005

* Massoumeh Ebtekar

 born 1940

..... FIRST woman to serve in a senior position since the 1979 Islamic revolution, when appointed as one of seven vice-presidents in 1997. She was formerly editor of the English language newspaper Kayhan International, had a PhD in chemistry and had written articles on the environment and immunology

* Mathilde d'Udekem d'Acoz

..... speech therapist who, in December 1999, was in line to become the FIRST Belgian-born Queen in the nation's history when she married Belgium's crown Prince Philippe

* Mathilde Landeta

 ..... FIRST woman film director in Mexico

* Mathilde Schodjt

 ..... in 1906 she was the FIRST woman to obtain a Norwegian degree

* Matti Aldersen

..... FIRST woman director general with the Advertising Standards Authority (ASA), their top post. She was the deputy director general and took up her new position when Peter Thomson left.  At the time she had been with the ASA for 15 years with an ad agency background

* Maud - Queen

born 1869 died 1938

..... daughter of Queen Alexandria and grand-daughter of Queen Victoria she became the FIRST modern Queen of Norway in 1905 when she married Prince Carl who took the name Haakon when he was elected King of Norway. It is also possible that she may have been one of the first women to undergo successful fertility treatment in the earliest years of the last century but this has been strongly denied by Norwegian royals of today and also by her grandson. Her son Olav was born on July 2nd 1903 after they had been trying for six years and from the start there were rumours in Danish high society

* Maud Watson

..... the FIRST Wimbledon lady champion in 1884

* Maude Adams

..... Swedish star who was the FIRST actress to be given a leading part in more than one James Bond film when in The Man With The Golden Gun she was the girlfriend of Scaramanga and in 1983 starred in Octopussy

* Maude Gonne

 born 1865 died 1953

..... FIRST French diplomat for Ireland on the creation of the Irish Free State in late 1921. She was an active member of Sinn Fein

* Maude Royden

 ..... FIRST President of the Society for the Ministry of Women

* Maude Valerie White

 born 1855 died 1937

..... FIRST woman to win the Mendelssohn Scholarship (1879) but she had to resign in 1881 because of ill health. She wrote about 200 songs and being an accomplished linguist she also translated many texts, poems and books

* Maudie Edwards

..... actress who spoke the FIRST words in the FIRST episode of the television soap Coronation Street as Elsie Lappin, the FIRST ever shopkeeper in the street in September 1960. She only appeared in the show that one time as she was in the process of selling it to Florrie Lindley, played by Betty Alberge

* Maureen Black

..... Scottish woman who was the FIRST woman director in the cashmere area of the British textile industry

* Maureen Catherine Connolly

 born 17th September 1934 died June 21st 1969

..... American who was the FIRST woman ever to achieve the 'grand slam' i.e. Wimbledon, American, French and Australian titles in one year which she did in 1953. At 16 she won the US Singles title and in 1952 won Wimbledon at her first attempt. She was regarded as among the top few players of all time but her career ended prematurely in July 1954 after a riding accident. She continued to coach but sadly died at the age of 35 of cancer on the eve of Wimbledon

* Maureen Coxon

..... FIRST woman door-keeper at the House of Commons on March 26th 1994

* Maureen Garrett

..... Englishwoman who was the FIRST non-American to receive the Bob Jones award for distinguished sportsmanship in golf since it was inaugurated in 1955. At the time she was president of the Ladies Golf Union and a former Curtis Cup captain

* Maureen Constance Guinness

 Marchioness of Dufferin and Ava

 born January 31st 1907 died 1998

..... one of the FIRST two women on the board of Guinness . With her two sisters Aileen and Oonagh they were known as the "Golden Guinness Girls" and were the darlings of  1920s society and it is said that Maureen was one of the FIRST women in London to dare to wear nude stockings

* Maureen Lipman

..... FIRST honorary patron of the cancer charity International Myeloma Foundation in the UK. Myeloma attacks the plasma cells found in bone marrow responsible for protecting the body against virus and infection

* Maureen Martin

..... English policewoman who was the F1RST woman in the police force to be shot in mainland Britain in 1982. She was left with a shattered spine and condemned to a wheelchair for life. In 1997 she was found dead at her home in Northumberland

* Maureen 'Mo' Mowlam

born 1949 died 2005

..... English politician who was the FIRST woman to be given the Freedom of the City of Redcar

* Maureen Rose

neé Rawson

..... Englishwoman who was the FIRST woman to be awarded a Royal Warrant as designer and dressmaker to the Queen in 1999 after she had worked for many years for Norman Hartnell and Ian Thomas, both dressmakers to the Queen. When Ian Thomas died in 1993 she was asked by the Queen to continue design work and eventually received her Royal Warrant

* Maureen Tomison

..... FIRST woman lobby correspondent with the Daily Express

* Maxine King

 born 1944

..... American U.S Air Force officer who joined as an officer candidate and received her commission as a second lieutenant. Having risen to the rank of Captain, in 1973 she became the FIRST woman to hold a faculty position at the Air Force Academy when she became a diving coach. She was more well known as a champion diver and in 1969 entered the World Military Games, competing against men and performing dives that no other woman had done in competition. Between 1969 and 1972 she won ten national springboard  and platform diving championships and at the 1972 Olympics she won a gold medal in the springboard event

* May Agnes Fleming

 born 1840 died 1880

neé Early

 ..... FIRST best selling novelist in Canada

* May Irwin

..... with John Rice she performed the FIRST screen kiss in close-up in 1896 in a film scene from The Widow Jones and the film itself received the FIRST film reviews with a contemporary journal describing it as           ' absolutely disgusting'

* May Mellanby

 born 1882 died 1978

neé Tweedy

..... FIRST woman to present a paper to the British Orthodontics Society in 1919

* May Robson

..... FIRST Australian actor to be nominated for an Oscar which was for her part in the film Lady For a Day

* May Rogers

 neé Mabel Marie

 born May 18th 1906 died 1990

..... said to be the FIRST incubator baby. She was called "Baby Chanell" and weighed only 3½ lbs at birth and was kept in a box-like specially ventilated apparatus  in which premature babies were placed to keep them at a warm, even temperature. she grew up to be a typical English girl of average height and weight

* May Abel Smith

 neé Her Serene Highness Princess May Helen Emma of Teck

born January 23rd 1906 died 1994

..... first cousin once removed to Queen Elizabeth 11 and daughter of Princess Alice she was the last remaining member of the Royal Family to have been born with a German style and title and the FIRST Royal bride to omit the word 'obey' from the marriage service in 1931

* May Sutton

..... FlRST American woman to win Wimbledon, making it the FIRST time in the history of the Lawn Tennis Championships that the title went abroad. She was 17 years old and beat Dorothea Douglass of Great Britain, the Ladies Singles Champion in 1903 and 1904 and who regained the title in 1906

* May Whitty

..... in 1918 she was the FIRST British actress to be made a Dame of the British Empire, not for her work in the theatre, but for her charity work during the First World War. She pioneered army camp shows, started a home for disabled servicemen and spearheaded numerous other war-related services. In 1942 she became the FIRST British Dame to be nominated for an Oscar as Best Supporting Actress in Mrs Miniver

* Maya Angelou

 neé Marguerite Johnson

 born 1928

..... author, poet, songwriter, dancer, actor,, director and producer who was the FIRST black woman director in Hollywood and FIRST Reynolds Professor of American Studies. Author of I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings which was the FIRST non-fiction work by a black woman to make the best seller lists and the FIRST poet to appear at the inauguration of a President  (Clinton 1993) since Robert Frost appeared at JFKs

* Mayumi Moriyama

born 1928

..... FIRST woman Chief Cabinet Secretary in Japan. It was a tradition that the Prime Minister's Trophy should be handed to the winner of the sumo New Year's Grand Tournament by the Chief Cabinet Secretary but because she was a woman a furious debate broke out about her intention to exercise this prerogative of her office. It was regarded as unlucky for a woman to tread the sacred soil of the dohyo (fighting ring) just as every effort was made to keep women out of mines and tunnels during construction. A champion of women's rights she was determined to put up a fight to be allowed to present the trophy 

* Meena Pathak

..... winner of the FIRST Asian Woman of Achievement Award in 1999

* Meg Ryan and Julia Roberts

..... FIRST two female stars in Hollywood to earn the same as their male counterparts - Meg Ryan $8m and Julia Roberts $12m. In 1998 Julia became the FIRST actress to earn $20m for one film

* Megan Thomas

 ..... FIRST person to win a discrimination case because of her youth after she was sacked by the Eight Members Club in Central London who said that at twenty years old she was not old enough to deal with their clients - November 2007

* Megan Williams

 ..... FIRST Arts Officer appointed by the Bolton Institute in Greater Manchester and her brief was to foster links between arts activities within the institute and the community

* Melanie Klein

 neé Reizes

..... Austrian who was one of the FIRST Freudian-trained psychoanalyst to work with children , she was recognised for her technique of play therapy, the FIRST important therapeutic innovation designed to suit psychoanalytic methods to young children

* Melanie Robinson and Suzannne Moore

..... FIRST women in naval history to take command of a warship when they were appointed to Archer class fast coastal patrol boats with a crew of five in 1998. The 98 ft vessels were used to introduce university students to life in the Navy and during wartime would be fitted with a 20mm bow gun and two machine guns. In 1999 Melanie and her husband Guy  became the FIRST husband and wife to command Royal Navy vessels when she took command of HMS Express and he took command of HMS Guernsey

* Melissa Johnson

..... FIRST ever 'streaker' on the Centre Court at Wimbledon in 1996. Aged 23 she graduated from Manchester University with a degree in graphic design and at the time of her streak was working in the food village during the tennis fortnight

* Melli Beese

..... FIRST German woman to get a fixed-wing pilots licence. She flew the Rumpler Taube in demonstrations for German military to show how easy it was  ( from Dave Lam)

* Merata Mita

 born 1942

..... FIRST Maori woman ever to direct a feature film. She trained as a home science teacher but moved into filmmaking after being asked to do liaison work for crews working on Maori subjects

* Mercedes Gleitz

 born 1900 died 1981

..... FIRST English woman to swim the English Channel when she crossed from France to England on October 7th 1927. The greatest number of Channel conquests by a woman is 19 (including five two-way) by Cynthia M Nicholas from July 29th 1975 to September 14th 1982

* Merlyn Lowther

..... in 1998 she became the FIRST woman chief cashier to the Bank of England and therefore for the FIRST time in 300 years a woman's signature appeared on British banknotes

* Meryl Streep

..... FIRST repeat winner of the Hackies Thumbs Down Award in 1997 given for her role in Marvin's Room, as a chain smoker who lights up in a hospital. Her previous one was given for her part in the film Bridges of Madison County when she played a similar character who smoked a lot of cigarettes. The awards ceremony is held by the American Lung Association. On 16th April 1998 she was the winner of the FIRST Bette Davis Lifetime Achievement Award

* Meta Joyce

neé Murdock

..... FIRST Naafi girl to land in Normandy after D-day when she crossed the Channel with 25 other Naafi girls and 1200 soldiers while under fire from German gunners on the French coast. She went ashore on august 3rd 1944

* Mette Groetteland

..... FIRST woman fighter pilot in Norway in March 1992. After training for 2½ years at Sheppard Air Force Base in Texas she was told that she would join an F-16 squadron, possibly at the Bodoe air base in north Norway. "I decided to become a combat pilot when I told the guys at officer's school that I'd like to fly fighters. They made it clear I would never make it"

* Mhairi McKay

..... on 22nd December 1996 she became the FIRST British golfer to win a scholarship to Stanford University in America

* Michele Cockburn

..... Englishwoman who was the FIRST woman to qualify for the Football Association's highest coaching award - the Advanced Coaching Licence

* Michele Elizabeth

..... England's FIRST fully-accredited pole dancing instructor whose classes are called Wiggle and Giggle With Me

* Michele Mouton

born June 23rd 1951

..... French woman who was the FIRST woman to win the Portuguese Port Wine motor rally in 1982 driving an Audi Quatro and taking the lead for much of the 1,394 miles. She was actually the FIRST woman to win a World Championship Rally, and that was the Rallye San Remo in Italy on October 10th 1981, in an Audi Quattro.  The San Remo was a more historic "first"

* Michele Stephens

neé Pamela Lawrence

..... FIRST American woman presenter on a national British radio show when she took over the Morning Edition show in 1993 on Radio 5

* Micheline Bernardi

..... modelled the FIRST bikini at a Paris fashion show on 5th July 1946. It was four days after the Americans had detonated an atomic bomb at Bikini Atoll in the Pacific. The designer was Louis Reard and the bikini was so-called by him to express time idea of the ultimate . It was made of cotton and printed with a newspaper design. After pictures of Micheline modelling it were released, it was reported that she received 50,000 fan letters. In 1950 in Britain, Mrs Yvonne Goodman wore a home-made bikini on Hampstead Heath but was told by police that her costume did not conform to regulations and that she must put her clothes on at once

* Michelle Bachelet

..... Chile's FIRST woman president when she succeeded Ricardo Lagos in 2005 after taking 53.4% of the vote. Aged 54 years she is a paediatrician and a former political prisoner of ex-dictator Augusto Pinochet

* Michelle Derbyshire

..... FIRST person in the Manchester TEC area to complete a Modern Apprenticeship in 1996 including achieving a National Vocational Qualification Level 3 in business administration

* Michelle Goodman - Flight Lt

..... FIRST woman to win a Distinguished Flying Cross which was awarded for her heroic helicopter rescue mission when under fire in Basra, Iraq - 2008

* Michelle Norris

..... a teenage Army medical officer who became the FIRST woman to be awarded the Military Cross, one of the highest honours for gallantry in combat - March 2007. The Military Cross is awarded to soldiers for exemplary gallantry during active operations against the enemy and ranks only below the Victoria Cross and the Conspicuous Gallantry Cross as a recognition of bravery in battle

* Michelle Plant

..... FIRST woman warder at Brixton Prison in London in 1986

* Michelle Smith

..... in 1996 at Atlanta she became the FIRST lrish woman to win an Olympic gold medal in the 400m freestyle swimming and on the following day she won a second goal in the 400m individual medley. Subsequently she won a third

* Midge MacKenzie

born March 6th 1938 died 2004

..... flamboyant film-maker who championed feminism and was the FIRST woman to form an all-woman film crew

* Miina Sillanpaa

..... FIRST woman Minister in the Department of Social Affairs in Finland in 1927. Four years later she became Chairwoman of the Social Democrat Women's League and was the FIRST woman Speaker of Parliament from 1936-1947

* Mila Planinc

 born 1925

..... FIRST woman Prime Minister of a communist country (Yugoslavia) when in January 1982 it was announced that she would take over the post in May following a policy started by Tito of rotating senior posts in turn to nationals of various provinces. The official announcement said that she had been approved as successor to Mr Veselin Djuranovic, who would retire in May 1982, and she was due to be voted officially into the position by the Federal Assembly following general elections in April

* Mildred Bailey

neé Rinker

born 1907 died 1951

..... American who was one of the FIRST white singers to earn a reputation as a jazz singer. She was one of the FIRST female band vocalists and sang with Benny Goodman, Paul Whiteman and others before pursuing a solo career

* Mildred Mary Bailey

 born 1890 died 1960

..... FIRST woman to fly across the Irish Sea (1927) FIRST woman to make a return flight to Cape Town and the FIRST English woman to fly a glider. She was the daughter of Lord Rossmore and in 1911 married Abe Bailey, a South African millionaire. In 1927 she was awarded her pilots licence and a year later made an epic solo flight from Croydon to Cape Town and back, which she saw as a gesture of female independence. She flew in many international competitions, was awarded the Britannia Trophy and in 1930 was created a Dame

* Mildred Mary Bruce

 neé Petre

 born November 10th 1895 died 1990

..... aviator, racing driver and speed-boat pilot she made the FIRST crossing of the Yellow Sea and the FIRST solo flight from England to Japan in 1930. She is also credited with the longest solo flight and the record solo flight from India to French Indo-China and at one time held 17 world records for feats of speed and endurance on land, sea and in the air

* Mildred Alice Cable

 born 1878 died 1952

..... helped to found one of the FIRST girls schools in China

* Mildred Creak

 born August 11th 1898 died August 25th 1993

..... pioneering child psychiatrist and an expert on childhood autism, who founded the children's department at the Maudsley Hospital in 1929 and later became the FIRST physician to be appointed to the Department of Psychological Medicine of the Hospital for Sick Children, Great Ormond Street, London, from 1946-63. The Mildred Creak Unit at Great Ormond Street remains a testament to her work and there is a similar one in Perth, Australia. She was the daughter of an engineer who helped to ventilate the Mersey Tunnel, was brought up as a Quaker and qualified in medicine at University College Hospital in the early 1920s. She obtained higher qualifications in psychiatry and became an assistant physician at The Retreat in York which was a Quaker psychiatric hospital.  In 1933 she spent a year in America with the help of the Rockefeller Foundation. During the Second World War she was a Major in the Royal Army Medical Corps in India and after the war was over helped to develop a department devoted to psychological medicine at Great Ormond Street. Her most significant  work was her study of autism and she kept in touch for many years with children affected by this severe mental condition and chaired a working party which helped define its nature. She continued to work after retirement in New Zealand, America and Australia

* Mildred  Dow

.....  FIRST woman Chief Superintendent in Greater Manchester Police and was probably appointed to that rank on the date the Force was formed on 1st April 1974, or shortly after

* Mildred Ella 'Babe'  Zaharias

 neé Didrikson

 born 1914 died 1956

..... FIRST American woman to win the British Amateur Golf title in 1947. She turned professional in the same year and won 34 professional tournaments, including three U.S Open victories. In 1946 she helped to found the Ladies Professional Golf Association. Despite having cancer she continued to compete in the 1950s, winning five tournaments in 1954 and a sixth award as Woman Athlete Year of the Year. In 1982 a poll was taken among America's leading sports historians to name the ten most outstanding and influential athletes or administrators in American sports history. She was ranked second, right below her namesake Babe Ruth, the baseball player. She redefined the role of women athletes and opened up what had formerly been a narrow world and legitimised professional sports for women

* Mille Gade

..... the FIRST mother to swim the English Channel but after doing so said " I would not do it again for a $1m". This was in the summer of 1926 when she, Gertrude Ederle, Lillian Cannon and Clarabelle Barrett battled to be the first female to conquer the 21 mile stretch between Calais and Dover. Gertrude Ederle went into the record books

* Millicent Fawcett

 neé Garrett

 born June 11th 1847 died August 5th 1929

..... leader of the suffrage movement and member of the FIRST Women's Suffrage Committee in 1867. It was in her home in Cambridge that the scheme was launched which eventually led to the foundation of Newnham College. Her elder sister was Elizabeth Garrett Anderson. She worked to secure for married women the right to their own property which eventually led to the Married Women's property Act in 1882. In 1897 she was elected President of the National Union of Women's Suffrage societies but did not join with Mrs Pa