Helene Lange

Helene Lange (9 April 1848, Oldenburg - 13 May 1930, Berlin) was a pedagogue and feminist. She is a symbolic figure of the international and German civil rights feminist movement. In the years from 1919 to 1921 she was a member of the Hamburg Parliament. In 1928 she was honoured with the Grand Prussian State Medal (großen preußischen Staatsmedaille) "For Services to the State".

Helene Lange came from a middle class family in Oldenburg. Her parents were the merchant Carl Theodor Lange and his wife Johanne (born tom Dieck). When she was six years old, her mother died from tuberculosis in 1855, and in 1864 her father died from a stroke, where for one year she came under the legal guardianship of a South-German clergy house. In 1866, when Lange's wish to pursue teacher training was narrowed by her legal guardian's, she took an au pair placement at a boarding school in Petit Château, Alsace, where she gave lessons in German literature and grammar and thus was able to participate in teaching courses. She also began an intensive self-study in Philosophy, history of Literature and Religion, historical science and the ancient languages. In 1867, Lange received a placement as governess in the private household of an industrialist-family in Osnabruck.

In 1871 Lange moved to Berlin to prepare for her teacher exam, which she passed. Soon after in 1872, she worked as a private tutor, and immediately committed herself to the emancipation of women and girls through education; and entered the Verein deutscher Lehrerinnen und Erzieherinnen (Association of German Women Teachers and Tutors). From 1874, Lange taught languages at the Krahmerschen Höheren Mädchenschule (Krahmerschen Girls High School) in Lichtenberg near Berlin. Between 1876-1891 she was active as teacher and director of the seminar class at the Crainschen Höheren Mädchenschule (Crainschen Girls High School), a private Women's College in Berlin, where she also established a seminar for women teachers.

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