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Years before her critics dubbed her

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one of the most dangerous people in America,

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a young woman named Emma Goldman

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found herself at a dance.

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Although she was a political activist

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attending the event to gain support for her cause,

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she also just loved dancing --

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so much so that one of her allies took her aside

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to criticize her for being frivolous and undignified.

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After all, should a serious activist

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be seen having so much fun?

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Furious at the interruption,

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Goldman told the young man

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to mind his own business,

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because the liberty she fought for

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was not about the "denial of life and joy."

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Instead, she said,

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"I want freedom,

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the right to self-expression,

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everybody's right to beautiful, radiant things."

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For Goldman, a revolution without dancing

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was not a revolution worth having.

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She was born in 1869 to Jewish parents

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in the Russian Empire and raised by a

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distant mother and an abusive father

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who tried to force her to marry at age 15.

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When she refused, he threw her French

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grammar book in the fire, saying,

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"Girls do not have to learn much!

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All a Jewish daughter needs to know

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is how to prepare gefullte fish,

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cut noodles fine, and give the man

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plenty of children."

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There are few women in her era who would defy

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that idea of womanhood quite as much

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as Emma Goldman.

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When she was 16, she escaped her father

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by emigrating to the United States,

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where she discovered her true calling:

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a political rebel and a fiery orator who would spend

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her entire life calling for revolution.

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She was horrified by the tragic story

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of several labor activists who were executed

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in Chicago, and found herself drawn to the labor

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movement and eventually to anarchism.

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Contrary to what that word might suggest,

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Goldman's philosophy was not about

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disorder and chaos.

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It was about personal freedom

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and rejecting institutions she believed

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were repressive:

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government, religion, war,

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business interests,

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and even marriage.

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Although she did end up marrying several times

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out of convenience or for citizenship,

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Goldman rejected traditional notions of marriage

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and chose never to have children.

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Goldman quickly became one of the most

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famous radical figures in America,

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whose power with words was sometimes

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referred to as a "sledgehammer."

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She traveled across the country

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speaking so passionately that the famed reporter,

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Nellie Bly,

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would dub her a "little Joan of Arc."

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Over the years, Goldman was sent to prison

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for her ideas several times,

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once for promoting birth control,

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once for discouraging men from registering

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for the draft, and once for

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telling unemployed workers to "take bread"

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from the wealthy if they were deprived

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of work and food.

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Despite her support for female independence,

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she often found herself at odds with suffragists,

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believing it less important to get women the vote

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in systems she viewed as oppressive

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than to dismantle them entirely.

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Emma said, "the right to vote, or equal civil rights,

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may be good demands, but true emancipation

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begins neither at the polls nor in courts."

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She said, "it begins in woman's soul."

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She believed that women needed to reject

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the sexist rules of societies and governments

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and assert their right to make decisions

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about their lives and their bodies.

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Only that, said Goldman, would truly

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set women free.

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Although she was heterosexual,

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Goldman was one of the earliest

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American advocates for gay rights,

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as well as birth control

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and the sexual freedom of women.

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"I demand the independence of woman;

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her right to support herself;

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to live for herself;

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to love whomever she pleases,

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or as many as she pleases," she wrote.

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"I demand freedom for both sexes,

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freedom of action, freedom in love,

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and freedom in motherhood."

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Many of her ideas about gender, sex, and sexuality

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would be considered controversial even today--

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and in the late 1800s,

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they were positively shocking.

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Goldman was a thorn in the side of

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American authorities for many years.

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In 1919, they finally declared

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her American citizenship invalid,

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and deported her back to Russia,

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which had recently had

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a people's revolution of its own.

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But what she found in the aftermath

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was not the utopia of her dreams,

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but rather another repressive regime

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willing to crush the rights of its own citizens.

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After meeting with Lenin himself,

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she became deeply disillusioned

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with the new, communist government.

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So she traveled abroad speaking out about

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the oppressiveness of the Soviets,

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which alienated many of her allies

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and got her ejected from both

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Sweden and Germany.

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When she finally returned to America in 1934

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(with the permission

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of the Roosevelt administration)

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Goldman was a grandmotherly figure in her 60s,

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but just as stubborn and outspoken

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as she'd ever been.

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On her final U.S. speaking tour,

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her speeches rallied against

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the fascism of Hitler's Germany

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and the communism of Stalin's Russia,

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angering people on the right and the left.

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Even old age could not dampen

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her revolutionary spirit;

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at 67, she traveled to Barcelona

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to support workers and anarchists

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who had risen up against fascism

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during the Spanish Civil War.

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She called them a "shining example"

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to the rest of the world,

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and told an audience of 10,000 that

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"your ideal has been my ideal for 45 years,

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and it will remain to my last breath."

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At the end of her life,

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when the goals of her cause seemed more

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unpopular and further away

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from reality than ever,

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Goldman never wavered in her beliefs,

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even when the price was deportation,

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threats of violence, and prison terms.

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She hoped that her example could light the way

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for future generations as well.

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As she wrote to a friend and former lover

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years before her death,

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"someday, sometime long after we're gone,

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liberty may again raise its proud head.

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It is up to us to blaze its way --

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dim as our torch may seem today --

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it is still the one flame."

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Throughout her life, Goldman had a knack

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for infuriating both friends and foes,

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but would never compromise her convictions

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or the way she lived to please either of them.

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"A trail of bonfires marked Goldman's

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rampage through life,"

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wrote one historian, and indeed,

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Goldman was willing to burn almost any bridge

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in the name of her truth.

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As she once said

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(when a young man tried to stop her from dancing)

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she would never stop fighting for a world

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where liberty was the birthright

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of every human being,

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and where women could

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live, love, and dance

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as freely as they wanted.