Rosario Ferré

(1938 - 2016)

Born in 1938 to one of the wealthiest and most influential families in Puerto Rico—her father was the territory’s third governor—Rosario Ferré attended university in the United States, later becoming a writer and vocal proponent of feminism in Puerto Rico. An accomplished writer in both Spanish and English, she translated her own works. Once an outspoken advocate for Puerto Rican independence, Ferré generated controversy when, in 1998, she argued in favor of statehood in the New York Times. She died in 2016 in San Juan.