Brownie Wise: In the 1950s, Brownie Wise revolutionized how America shopped.

A single mother, Brownie pioneered the "Tupperware Party," transforming suburban living rooms into sales floors and housewives into entrepreneurs. Her genius was simple: let women sell to women, in their own homes, on their own terms. Under her leadership, Tupperware sales skyrocketed to $25 million. Wise became the first woman to grace the cover of Business Week (1954). Irked by the attention lavished on Brownie, Tupperware's famously curmudgeonly founder, Earl Tupper, fired her and erased her from company history.