This is a timeline of women in library science throughout the world.
1911: Theresa Elmendorf became the first woman elected president of the American Library Association.
1912: Lillian Helena Smith became the first trained children's librarian in Canada in 1912.
1923: Virginia Proctor Powell Florence became the first black woman in the United States to earn a degree in library science. She earned the degree (Bachelor of Library Science) from what is now part of the University of Pittsburgh.
1947: Freda Farrell Waldon became the first president of the Canadian Library Association, and thus, as she was female, its first female president.
1972: Zoia Horn, born in Ukraine, became the first United States librarian to be jailed for refusing to share information as a matter of conscience (and, as she was female, the first female United States librarian to do so.)
1973: Page Ackerman became University Librarian for the University of California, Los Angeles, and was the United States's first female librarian of a system as large and complex as UCLA's.
1993: Jennifer Tanfield became the first female Librarian of the House of Commons of the United Kingdom.
1999: Elisabeth Niggermann became the first female director general of the German National Library.
2000: Lynne Brindley was appointed as the first female chief executive of the British Library.
2002: Inez Lynn was appointed as the first female librarian in the London Library's history.
2012: Sonia L'Heureux became the first female Parliamentary Librarian of Canada.
2016: Laurence Engel became the first female head of the French National Library.
2016: Carla Hayden became the first female Librarian of Congress.