Who was the first female prime minister of the United Kingdom?
Margaret Thatcher was the first female prime minister of the United Kingdom, serving from 1979 to 1990. She was the longest-serving British prime minister of the 20th century.
Thatcher was born in 1925 in Grantham, Lincolnshire, the daughter of a grocer. She studied chemistry at Oxford and later became a lawyer before entering Parliament in 1959. She became leader of the Conservative Party in 1975 and won three general elections, in 1979, 1983 and 1987.
Her government reduced the power of trade unions, sold state-owned industries and promoted free markets, policies known as Thatcherism. She led Britain during the Falklands War with Argentina in 1982. Her policies were praised by supporters for reviving the economy and strongly criticized by opponents for causing unemployment and division.
The Iron Lady
A Soviet newspaper nicknamed her the Iron Lady in 1976, and she embraced the name. She resigned in 1990 after a challenge to her leadership. She died in 2013. Theresa May and Liz Truss later became Britain's second and third female prime ministers.
Did You Know?
Sirimavo Bandaranaike of Sri Lanka became the world's first female prime minister in 1960, almost two decades before Thatcher.