The Birth of the Pill

It has been called the only product in American history so powerful that it needed no name. Today we know it simply as "the pill," but it was made possible only through the efforts of four larger-than-life figures. The Birth of the Pill, based on Jonathan Eig's 2014 book, The Birth of the Pill: How Four Crusaders Reinvented Sex and Launched a Revolution, follows feminist icon Margaret Sanger and philanthropist Katherine McCormick, who campaigned for women's rights and championed birth control, enlisting the help of visionary scientist Gregory Pincus and Catholic OB/GYN John Rock. Together, the four took on the scientific establishment, the church and cultural norms in their fight to make safe and effective contraception available to millions of women. The Birth of the Pill is a thrilling recounting of the development of a drug that forever changed medical and social history.