A champion of women's rights, racial equality, scientific progress, economic fairness and cooperatives, Harriet Martineau's popular and influential writing on political and economic issues led to fame across Europe and America in the 1830s.

The first female journalist and a founder of sociology she she was a pioneer amongst pioneers. Martineau influenced Charles Darwin, George Eliot, Charles Dickens, Charlotte Bronte, Florence Nightingale, Josephine Butler and many others.

Her encounters with figures such as these reverberate even today.

She was truly a woman ahead of her time.