Photo: Muriel Siebert & Co., Inc., Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons
Who She Is:
Muriel Siebert was born in Cleveland, Ohio, in 1928. In 1954, she drove to New York City in a used car with just $500 and landed a job as a trainee in the research department at the investment firm Bache & Co., earning $65 a week. She taught herself to analyze companies and became an expert on the airline industry as jet planes arrived, meeting with aviation executives and engineers to figure out which companies would succeed. She soon discovered she was being paid far less than the men beside her. When she looked for a new job in 1958, no one answered her résumé until she sent it out using only her initials, "M. F. Siebert," and then she got an interview right away. In 1967, after nine of the first ten men she asked refused to sponsor her, she became the first woman to buy a seat on the New York Stock Exchange, joining 1,365 men.
Why She Matters:
Siebert proved that a financial analyst's real power is in the quality of her research, and she used that power to open a door that had been closed to women for 175 years. She went on to found her own brokerage firm, became New York State's first woman Superintendent of Banks in 1977, and later created a personal finance program taught in New York City high schools so teenagers could learn to manage money. Her story shows young people that curiosity, hard work, and refusing to take no for an answer can change an entire industry.
