“Gloria lived true to her independent spirit, always with curiosity and a great sense of humour.”
Gloria Steinem speaks following the second Presidential debate at a Planned Parenthood Advocacy Event at the Pacific Design Center in West Hollywood, California, on October 8, 2004 (Getty Images)Getty Images
Born in Ohio to a Jewish father and Presbyterian mother in 1934, Steinem was the granddaughter of Pauline Perlmutter Steinem, a Polish-born women’s rights campaigner who helped rescue several family members from the Holocaust.
She grew up on the road in a trailer, from which his father operated his business as an antique dealer.
Her mother, Ruth, suffered a prenatal nervous breakdown, which left her unable to maintain a job, and the young Gloria’s interest in social justice advocacy is said to have been sparked by her mother’s treatment by employers and doctors.
In 1957, aged 22, she had an abortion in London while travelling to India. The procedure was performed by a British doctor, John Sharpe, “a decade before physicians in England could legally perform an abortion for any reason other than the health of the woman,” she wrote in her memoir, My Life on the Road.
Upon her return to America, she worked as a journalist and freelance writer, covering issues including contraception, choice and women’s rights within marriage.
She also briefly worked as a “playboy bunny” in 1963, which resulted in an article documenting the treatment of female employees at the Playboy Club in New York, after which Playboy boss Hugh Hefner dropped the requirement for the “bunnies” to undergo gynaecological examinations and STD testing.
Chita Rivera (1L), Eleanor McGovern (2L), wife of US Democratic politician George McGovern, US actress Shirley MacLaine (3L), and Gloria Steinem (2R) raise their arms at the 'curtain call' of the 'Women for McGovern' campaign rally at Madison Square Garden on 27th October 1972 (Getty Images)Getty Images
In 1972, she co-founded the feminist magazine Ms. and became the first woman to speak at the National Press Club.
Four years later, she was one of 13 women who attended the US’ first women-only seder at the home of fellow activist Esther M Broner.
Over the years, she campaigned for greater reproductive freedom, better education for girls and stronger protections for women’s civil rights and against sexual violence.
She also publicly opposed the Vietnam War, the First Gulf War and the Iraq War.
In 2000, aged 66, she married David Bale, the father of Dark Knight actor Christian Bale, though he died of brain cancer in 2003.
She was diagnosed with breast cancer in 1986, but went into remission, and trigeminal neuralgia, a rare chronic pain disorder, in 1994.
Steinem never had any children and was open about the fact that she was content not to, famously saying: “Everybody with a womb doesn’t have to have a child any more than everybody with vocal cords has to be an opera singer.”
