Women who have dared to run for the presidency

3/8/2007 9:03:43 AM

By Allison Lapp

Associated Press

It's been a big year for women's firsts.

The U.S. House of Representatives has its first woman speaker, Harvard University named its first woman president and Hillary Clinton is hoping to break through the highest American glass ceiling of all -- running to become America's first woman commander in chief.

"When I was growing up, I used to facetiously say I would one day be president, but it was based on nothing but delusions of grandeur," said Glenna Matthews, a visiting scholar at the University of California-Berkeley, who has written five books on women's history. "Now a young girl wanting to be president has a lot to look up to."

As recently as 20 years ago, there were so few women in leadership positions that it wasn't plausible to imagine one taking the reins of government, she said. But that doesn't mean some didn't try.

Here are five women who attempted to make it to the Oval Office before Hillary Clinton's run.

Continued