Zofi Yamaika

Unlike many in the 1930's, Zofia Yamaika -- barely a teenager, though already in-your-face -- recognized the dangers of the fascist ideology sweeping Europe and joined Spartacus, a communist club at school dedicated to fighting the movement. Then, when the Germans occupied Poland, Yamaika quit school and revived the now banned club to print and distribute anti-fascist posters and leaflets throughout Warsaw, despite the obvious dangers involved.

In 1940, when the Germans rounded up and forced more than 400,000 Jews behind the walls of an area not much more than a mile square, Yamaika trained with a pistol, but she was afraid to take further action for fear of repercussions descending on her parents. When they were all deported for parts unknown, however, Yamaika escaped and joined a band of resistance fighters near Radom.

On February 9, 1943, three hundred German soldiers suddenly descended on a group of fifty resisters. Yamaika and two others volunteered to engage the Germans while their comrades could get away. Yamaika -- in-your-face to the end -- saved her bullets until the enemy was within eight feet of her before opening fire with her machine gun. She died protecting the backs of her fleeing unit. In-your-face women are never more alive than at the moment of their deaths.