Ten Girls Who Made History - Paperback

Every Remarkable Woman Was Once an Ordinary Girl

History did not appoint them. They did not set out to be famous. They simply followed God — into hospitals, into classrooms, into remote jungles, into the wreckage of other people’s pain — and the world was changed by what they did there.

Ten Girls Who Made History tells the stories of ten women who followed God faithfully, at great personal cost, into places and callings that the world had not prepared them for. And it begins at the beginning — when they were girls, making mistakes, playing games, learning who they were and what the world was.

Your story, it suggests quietly, might begin the same way.

About This Book

Published by Christian Focus, Ten Girls Who Made History is part of the beloved Lightkeepers series by award-winning author Irene Howat — a series introducing readers aged 8–12 to the joy of reading Christian biography. This volume brings together ten women whose lives span the nineteenth and twentieth centuries and whose contributions to medicine, education, mission, and the church have left permanent marks on the world.

What distinguishes this volume from others in the Lightkeepers Girls series is the particular range of callings represented. These are not only ministers’ wives or missionaries’ companions — though some are. They are a pioneering physician who founded India’s first medical college for women, a pilot who helped build Mission Aviation Fellowship, a nursing reformer who transformed healthcare across the British Empire, an educator who shaped a generation of evangelical leaders, and a missionary whose response to her husband’s murder became one of the most powerful testimonies to grace in the twentieth century.

Each chapter is approximately fifteen pages — short enough for one bedtime or one sitting — told with Irene Howat’s characteristic warmth, vivid detail, and narrative skill.

Meet the Ten Girls

Ida Scudder (1870–1960) — Born to a missionary family in India, Ida initially resisted the call to return. But one night, when three men came seeking medical help she could not give and all three later died in childbirth, she committed her life to medicine. She founded the Vellore Christian Medical College in Tamil Nadu — India’s first medical college for women — which today is one of India’s most prestigious medical institutions. For readers in India, Ida Scudder’s story is particularly immediate: her legacy is still present and active in the Indian healthcare system.

Betty Greene (1920–1997) — A Women Airforce Service Pilot in World War II who went on to become a co-founder of Mission Aviation Fellowship — the organisation that has brought the gospel, medicine, and humanitarian aid to remote regions around the world by air for over seventy years.

Jeanette Li (1896–1968) — Chinese Christian evangelist who persevered in gospel ministry through the upheavals of war, revolution, and the establishment of Communist rule in China, and who helped sustain and spread Christianity among Chinese women through decades of extreme difficulty.

Mary Jane Kinnaird (1816–1888) — British philanthropist and co-founder of the YWCA (Young Women’s Christian Association), who pioneered advocacy for the welfare of young working women in Victorian England at a time when their vulnerability was largely ignored.

Bessie Adams — Missionary nurse who devoted her life to serving in Africa, bringing both medical care and the gospel to communities that had little access to either.

Emma Dryer (1835–1925) — American Christian educator who worked closely with D. L. Moody to establish what eventually became the Moody Bible Institute in Chicago — one of the most influential centres of evangelical education in the world.

Lottie Moon (1840–1912) — Southern Baptist missionary who spent nearly forty years in China, became one of the most effective advocates for women’s mission work in American church history, and whose influence on the Southern Baptist Convention’s global mission work continues to this day through the Lottie Moon Christmas Offering, which has raised hundreds of millions of dollars for international missions.

Florence Nightingale (1820–1910) — British nursing pioneer, statistician, and healthcare reformer whose work in the Crimean War transformed the practice of nursing and hospital care, and whose deeply held Christian faith was the explicit foundation of her calling to serve the sick and dying.

Henrietta Mears (1890–1963) — Christian educator and Director of Christian Education at First Presbyterian Hollywood whose Sunday school grew to more than five thousand and who shaped the lives of leaders including Bill Bright (founder of Campus Crusade for Christ) and Billy Graham — who credited her as one of the most significant influences on his ministry.

Elisabeth Elliot (1926–2015) — Missionary, author, and speaker whose husband Jim Elliot was killed alongside four other missionaries by the Huaorani people of Ecuador in 1956 — and who responded by returning to live among those same people with their young daughter. Her books Through Gates of Splendor and Shadow of the Almighty became classics of twentieth-century Christian literature.

What Children Will Learn

• That God uses ordinary girls — from many backgrounds, cultures, and centuries — to accomplish extraordinary things
• The stories of ten women whose callings took them into medicine, aviation, education, nursing, evangelism, and mission
• That faithfulness to God in the face of loss, danger, and difficulty is one of the most powerful forces in the world
• That women have always played a vital role in the advance of the gospel and the care of the world
• How to read and enjoy Christian biography — building a lifelong habit that will shape their faith

Who This Book Is For

Girls aged 8–12 who love stories and who need real, historically grounded role models — women who were brave, creative, and used by God in ways that changed medicine, education, and the course of mission history.

Indian families especially — Ida Scudder’s story is set in India, and Vellore Christian Medical College is a living legacy that many Indian readers will know. This book is in part the story of their own context.

Parents reading aloud who want to give their daughters a sense of what Christian women have accomplished — and what God might be preparing them for in turn.

Sunday school teachers and children’s ministry leaders wanting to introduce girls to the history of women in Christian mission and service.

Anyone looking for a meaningful gift for a girl aged 8–12 at a birthday, Christmas, or other occasion — a book that will shape the imagination and the faith together.

About the Author — Irene Howat

Irene Howat is an award-winning author and poet who lives in Scotland. She has published many biographical books for all ages and is particularly well known for her biographical material. She has written books about the lives of many different Christians from around the world. She is married to a retired minister, is a talented artist, and especially enjoys letters from young readers — replying to every one she receives.

Series Information — Lightkeepers

Ten Girls Who Made History is the fourth volume in the Lightkeepers Girls series published by Christian Focus — a series introducing readers aged 8–12 to the joy of reading Christian biography.

Other Lightkeepers Girls titles available or worth looking out for at forthetruth.in include:

• Ten Girls Who Made a Difference
• Ten Girls Who Changed the World
• Ten Girls Who Used Their Talents
• Ten Girls Who Didn’t Give In
• Lightkeepers Girls Box Set (all five volumes)

The parallel Lightkeepers Boys series — including Ten Boys Who Made History and Ten Boys Who Didn’t Give In, also available at forthetruth.in — features men of faith in the same format.

What Others Have Said

“Irene Howat writes with a real warmth and insight. People that you have never met come alive on the page. Christian legends and unsung heroes all become friends you can understand and look up to. In a world where role models of real integrity are few and far between, the Lightkeepers series fills the gap.” — Catherine MacKenzie, Children’s Editor, Christian Focus