Pictures of Sandra Day O’Connor’s Supreme Court tenure offer a visual timeline of gender inequality

Retired US Supreme Court justice Sandra Day O’Connor has announced her retirement from public life after being diagnosed with dementia, the New York Times reports.

O’Connor, the first woman to sit on America’s highest court, was a justice for more than two decades. Since her appointment by Ronald Reagan in 1981, the composition of the court has shifted dramatically. For years she was the sole woman, until Ruth Bader Ginsburg joined the court in 1993. There are now three women on the court: Ginsburg, Sonia Sotomayor and Elena Kagan.

Pictures from O’Connor’s time on the bench show the slow pace of demographic change over the years:

1982

1986

1988

1990

1991

1993

1994

2005

2006