Women in Business Quiz
What newspaper columnist wrote a best-selling book on personal finance in 1975?
- Sylvia Porter's Money Book was a best seller in 1975, followed in 1984 by Sylvia Porter's Personal Finance Magazine. Financial guru Suze Orman has also published several books, including The 9 Steps to Financial Freedom in 1997. Liz Smith writes a newspaper gossip column.
This former maid was the first woman to sell products by mail order, organize a nationwide door-to-door sales force, and open her own beauty school.
- In the early 1900s Sarah Breedlove Walker developed a hot comb to straighten black hair and other beauty products, which she sold by mail and through door-to-door agents under the label 'Madame C. J. Walker.' By 1914 the company was earning $1 million a year through operations in the United States, the Caribbean, and South America. Helena Rubinstein and Elizabeth Arden primarily distributed cosmetics through beauty parlors and department stores.
Known as the 'Queen of Seventh Avenue,' this fashion designer launched her own line in 1984.
- Known for her stylish business wear, often in basic black, Donna Karan is called the 'Queen of Seventh Avenue.' She worked for another New York designer, Liz Claiborne, while still in school. Gloria Vanderbilt's fashions were most popular in the 1970s and 1980s.
This leading New York publisher specializes in celebrity 'tell all' books.
- Judith Regan, of ReganBooks, an imprint of HarperCollins, has published a series of best sellers written by celebrities. Helen Gurley Brown was editor of Cosmopolitan magazine from 1965 to 1996, while Tina Brown publishes Talk magazine.
Her 1989 conviction for income tax evasion and her tough reputation earned this hotel owner the nickname 'The Queen of Mean.'
- Leona Helmsley served 18 months of a four-year prison term after being convicted of income tax evasion in 1989. After her husband Harry Helmsley's death in 1997, she was worth $1.5 billion, mostly in New York real estate. Comedienne and talk show host Joan Rivers now runs a company manufacturing costume jewelry. Los Angeles public relations executive Francesca Hilton is the daughter of hotel magnate Conrad Hilton.
After working as a stockbroker, she founded a catering company that led to a magazine and TV show devoted to cooking and entertaining.
- Martha Stewart founded the magazine Martha Stewart Living in 1990, and a syndicated TV show with the same name in 1993, focusing on cooking, crafts, and decorating. Ann Landers began writing a syndicated newspaper column in 1955, while fashion designer Donna Karan founded her own fashion house in 1984.
The first woman to purchase a seat on the New York Stock Exchange was:
- Known as the 'First Woman of Finance,' in 1967 Muriel 'Mickey' Siebert became the first woman to buy a seat on the New York Stock Exchange. For ten years she was the only woman among the 1,366 members. Henrietta 'Hetty' Green was a 19th-century financier, worth $100 million when she died in 1916. Wife of President Franklin Roosevelt, Eleanor Roosevelt was an activist, but never joined the NYSE.
Former publisher of the Washington Post newspaper and Newsweek magazine, she is one of the more prominent women in American business.
- After her husband's death in 1963, Graham became president of the Washington Post Company. From 1967 to 1979 she was also publisher, turning the newspaper into one of the most influential in the United States. Barbara Walters is a prominent TV journalist.
What cosmetics executive is known for giving pink Cadillacs as incentives for her sales staff?
- Mary Kay Ash founded Mary Kay Cosmetics in a Dallas storefront in 1963 with $5,000. With some 300,000 sales people working in 19 countries and over $1 billion in sales, it remains a major cosmetics firm today. Elizabeth Arden and Est�e Lauder also founded cosmetics companies bearing their names.
She became so prominent in the American labor movement that she earned the nickname 'Mother.'
- Mary Harris Jones was called 'Mother Jones' for her labor activism. She helped establish the International Workers of the World in 1905 and organized garment, mine, and streetcar workers. First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt was also a prominent labor union supporter. Journalist Ida Tarbell wrote critical accounts of business and industry, published in McClure's magazine, and a book on the Standard Oil Company in 1904.
