Maria Montessori
She forced her way into medicine, which did not admit women, and became one of the first women doctors in Italy. Working with children then called ineducable, she saw that the fault lay not in them but in the teaching: what was needed was not explanation but objects a child takes up for itself. In 1907 she opened the Casa dei Bambini in the San Lorenzo quarter of Rome — low tables, quiet, a free choice of occupation and materials that correct a mistake without an adult. The method spread round the world within ten years. Under Mussolini the schools were closed and she left — first for Spain and the Netherlands, then for India, where she spent the war teaching teachers. Three nominations for the Nobel Peace Prize; she died in the Netherlands in 1952.
She was born at Chiaravalle on 31 August 1870 at 03:30 local mean time — Italy had no single time until 1893. The hour is in the record of her birth.