Short answers, pulled from the story.
Reform Judaism traces its foundation to the 17th of July 1810, when Israel Jacobson held the first recognized Reform Jewish service in a school chapel in Seesen, in the Kingdom of Westphalia. The movement's intellectual foundations were developed in mid-19th-century Germany, primarily by Rabbi Abraham Geiger and his associates.
Rabbi Abraham Geiger is generally considered the founding father of Reform Judaism. He developed the movement's core theological doctrine of progressive revelation and centered its philosophy on the ethical teachings of the biblical Prophets, which he had named "Prophetic Judaism" as early as 1838.
The World Union for Progressive Judaism (WUPJ) is the international umbrella organization for Reform, Liberal, and Progressive Jewish movements worldwide. Founded on the 12th of July 1926 in London, it estimates it represents at least 1.8 million people in 50 countries, including approximately 1 million registered adult congregants.
Regina Jonas was the earliest known female rabbi to be officially granted the title, ordained in 1935 by Max Dienemann, later chairman of the Vereinigung der liberalen Rabbiner. In 1972, Sally Priesand was ordained by Hebrew Union College, making her the first female rabbi ordained by a rabbinical seminary in the United States and the second formally ordained female rabbi in Jewish history.
The Pittsburgh Platform was a set of eight clauses proclaimed on the 19th of November 1885 by Rabbi Kaufmann Kohler and leading Reform rabbis. It declared that only moral laws were binding and that ceremonies were valid only when they elevated religious experience, while setting aside beliefs in bodily resurrection, the restoration of Temple sacrifices, and a personal Messiah. It is considered the defining document of Classical Reform Judaism, which dominated the movement from the 1860s through the 1930s.
Reform Judaism recognizes children born to one Jewish parent, whether mother or father, as Jewish provided they receive Jewish education and commit themselves to the faith. The North American Union for Reform Judaism adopted this policy in 1983, and the British Movement for Reform Judaism affirmed it in 2015. This position differs from traditional Jewish law, which recognizes only matrilineal descent, and has led some Reform Jews to not be accepted as Jewish by Conservative or Orthodox movements.