Dorothy Height was the only woman among the leadership of the civil rights movement, and was a tireless campaigner for women’s rights as well as racial equality, feeling them to be inextricably linked. I have to admit I hadn’t heard of her until hearing a piece about her on NPR yesterday, but I’ve since done a little research and she just seems to have lived one of those fascinating, inspiring lives. She was admitted to Barnard in the 1920′s, but denied entry on arrival as they had a policy then of only admitting two black students a year. She went on to get her undergraduate and master’s degrees at NYU, and launched into a public service career that spanned the next 70 years. She served as president of the National Council of Negro Women for 40 years, and was active on all kind of committees and councils examining equality right up until her death. She organized an activist group during the 1960′s called Wednesdays in Mississippi which brought women of all races, faiths and backgrounds together to simply talk to one another. And she was the person responsible for Martin Luther King’s closing slot during the march on Washington where he gave his I Have a Dream speech (she was not, however, despite her efforts, able to get a woman speaker added to the roster that day). If all of that weren’t enough, every personal account I’ve read talks about her as a true lady with extraordinary poise and personal style. She died yesterday at the age of 98, having lived a long and incredibly useful life.