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A fact from Nina Bang appeared on Wikipedia's Main Page in the Did you know column on 26 February 2008, and was viewed approximately 2,009 times (disclaimer) (check views). The text of the entry was as follows:
Did you know... that Nina Bang was one of the world's first female government ministers?
Nina Bang was NOT the first ever female minister in the world. See the page for Alexandra Kollontai, who was appointed people's Commissar for social welfare in 1917 (people's Commissar was a full equivalent of minister in the then Soviet government). The fact that the post was not named "minister" does not really matter, since e.g. we still name Bertie Ahern Irish PM, though officially his post is known as Taoiseach. —Preceding unsigned comment added by InArm (talk • contribs) 17:58, 6 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Interesting. Although I agree that it isn't too important whether the title of the post includes the word "minister", doesn't that still make Nina Bang the first female minister of an internationally recognised state? (As far as I remember, the Soviet Union was not recognised by major powers of the time until 1924, and it seems Kollontai was only People's Commissar until 1918, but I might be wrong?) I've edited the claim in this article anyway, to avoid having too much of Bang's article focus on Soviet and Irish history. Hemmingsen (talk) 19:23, 6 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I completely agree. Indeed, Kollontai held the post only until March 1918; Soviet Russia (not the Soviet Union, which was established only in 1922) had been recognized by only a couple of countries like Finland and Imperial Germany by that time. InArm (talk) 21:08, 6 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
