Happy birthday, Augusta Savage

Augusta Christine Fells was born on February 29, 1892, in Green Cove Springs, Florida. She began making sculptures as a child, using the natural clay abundant in her area. She liked to sculpt animals and other small figures, but her father didn't approve of it, and did whatever he could to stop her. He was a Methodist minister and believed it was a sin to make "graven images." Savage once said that her father "almost whipped all the art out of me."

"From the time I can first recall the rain falling on the red clay in Florida. I wanted to make things. When my brothers and sisters were making mud pies, I would be making ducks and chickens with the mud."
(source: TheHappyNappyBookseller)

But when he found a statue she sculpted of the Virgin Mary, he changed his mind. She entered some of her pieces into county fairs and won a number of honors. When she could not create a successful career as a sculptor in Florida, she moved to New York City, where she was able to study at the Cooper Union, which offered free tuition, and eventually even gave her a scholarship for her living expenses.

While she was at Cooper Union, she applied for a program to study sculpture abroad in France, but was denied solely because of her race. Instead of taking it lightly, she raised a fuss, wrote letters to the media, bringing attention to the racists practices of the program. The program still refused to accept her, but her life was changed, and she became quite active in the civil rights fight. And she became better acquainted with the movers and shakes in the movement. She was even commissioned to sculpt busts of famous civil rights leaders like W.E.B. Du Bois and Marcus Garvey.

And she did eventually travel to Paris on the Julius Rosenwald Fellowship, while enabled her study for one year. When she returned to Harlem, she was very active in the art scene, taught classes in the community, and in 1932 established the Savage Studio of Arts and Crafts. A few years later, she became the first director of the Harlem Community Arts Center -- which is considered to be the forerunner of similar community arts centers around the country.

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You may also be interested in:

Mary McLeod Bethune: suffrage and civil rights work
Mary McLeod Bethune's work with her school was remarkable in itself, and had she only focused on that, she would still be heralded for her contributions to society. But she did not. She could not. Her experiences trying to improve the lives of young African American women showed her that there was much work to be done -- both for their race and for their gender.

Happy Birthday - Septima Poinsette Clark
Septima Poinsette was born on May 3, 1898, in Charleston, South Carolina. Her father had been born a slave, and worked as a caterer after the Civil War. Her mother was born free in Charleston, but was taken to Haiti during the Civil War. After the war, she worked as a launderer, but did not work for whites, and refused to let her daughters work in white houses...

Eliza Ann Grier - the first black woman to receive a MD in Georgia
Very little is known about her early life. She was born during the Civil War. Her parents were slaves in Mecklenburg County, North Carolina, which made her a slave as well. After emancipation, her family moved to Atlanta, where she grew up and attended school. She originally intended to become a teacher, and attended Fisk University.

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Queen Ranavalona III of Madagascar

I learned something new this week. Actually, I try to learn something new every day, but this one took me by surprise. I saw an entry in Wikipedia saying that on February 28, 1897 --  115 years ago today --  the last Ruler of Madagascar, Queen Ranavalona III was deposed and sent to live in exile in Algeria.


I have to admit, for me, this is the first time I have really thought much about the history of Madagascar at all. And probably the first time I thought of an African queen of that era.

So, I did a quick Google search, to see what I could come up with.  And, sadly, it wasn't very much. There are a couple of sites in French, which tested my retention of high school French from so many years ago. But I was able to find a few sites in English.

As sovereign of Madagascar, Ranavalona III became a pawn in the endgame of the maneuvering that had been taking place between the British and French since the beginning of the century. The tension between France and Madagascar had grown especially acute in the three years prior to Ranavalona's succession. French aggressions against Malagasy towns along the coast intensified in the final months of the reign of Ranavalona II and were ongoing at the time that Ranavalona III was crowned the new queen in the summer of 1883. Shortly afterward, Prime Minister Rainilaiarivony decided to engage Lieutenant Colonel Willoughby, a Briton who had gained combat experience in the Anglo-Zulu War (but without having been a member of the British armed forces), to oversee the nation's military affairs and train the Queen's army to defend the island against the seemingly inevitable French invasion.
(source: wikipedia)

Most sites say basically the same thing. I would love to know more about her, her life, what life in Madagascar was like, what would have happened if they had been left to rule themselves?

During her reign, Queen Ranavalona III tried to thwart both French and British designs to control Madagascar by turning to the nation’s strategic trading partner—the United States—for support. Despite the queen’s efforts, her fate was sealed when the French finally invaded and colonized Madagascar in 1896. They abolished the Merina monarchy and exiled Queen Ranavalona III to Algeria, where she died in 1917.
(source: fyeahblackhistory)

Throughout her reign, Ranavalona utilized diverse tactics such as strengthening trade and diplomatic relations with the United States and Great Britain in the hope of staving off impending colonization. However, French attacks on coastal port towns and an assault on the capital of city of Antananarivo ultimately led to the capture of the royal palace in 1896, thereby ending the sovereignty and political autonomy of the century-old kingdom.
(source: afrikanwomen)

Sadly, her efforts to get American help didn't work. I wonder why? Was it because the US is friends with France? Was Madagascar not important enough? Were we busy elsewhere?

I have lots of questions. Maybe I'll brush up my French vocabulary, and try to read some of the French websites.

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Happy birthday, Marian Anderson

I grew up in a house filled with music and music history. I also grew up in a house that did not shy away from discussions about race and injustice. As a child, I knew the names Leontyne Price and Marian Anderson, among many other amazing African-American women musicians. I imagine I heard recordings of their music, although I don't have any memory of that.

The story of Marian Anderson's appearance at the Lincoln Memorial was well-known to me. It was a shameful story of how the supposedly upstanding social Daughters of the American Revolution refused to allow her to sing at Constitution Hall in front of an integrated audience, so many of the more progressive members of Washington, DC, changed the venue to the historically esteemed Lincoln Memorial.



She has always been associated with the civil rights movement in my memory. And justly so. In 1955, she was the first African American to sign with the Metropolitan Opera.



Her talent was such that it was recognized by the members of her community who worked to help her get the private training she needed and deserved, when she was refused entrance into the music college she wanted to attend.

When she was 15 years old, Marian began voice lessons with Mary Saunders Patterson, a prominent black soprano. Shortly thereafter, the Philadelphia Choral Society held a benefit concert, providing $500 for her to study for two years with leading contralto Agnes Reifsnyder. After she graduated from high school, her principal enabled her to meet Guiseppe Boghetti, a much sought-after teacher. When he heard Marian audition, singing “Deep River,” he was moved to tears.

Rather than fight much of the racism she received, despite her enormous popularity, Marian preferred to avoid situations whenever possible. In Europe, she was welcomed into the finest hotels and restaurants, but in the U.S., she was shifted to third- or fourth-class accommodations. In the South, she often stayed with friends. Simple tasks as arranging for laundry, taking a train, or eating at a restaurant were often difficult. She would take meals in her room and traveled in drawing rooms on night trains. She said:

“If I were inclined to be combative, I suppose I might insist on making an issue of these things. But that is not my nature, and I always bear in mind that my mission is to leave behind me the kind of impression that will make it easier for those who follow.”

Early on, she insisted on “vertical” seating in segregated cities; meaning black audience members would be allotted seats in all parts of the auditorium. Many times, it was the first time blacks would sit in the orchestra section. By 1950, she would refuse to sing where the audience was segregated.
(source: Women in History)

She sang at Eisenhower's inauguration, served as a goodwill ambassador for the US State Department, and continued to advocate for racial equality. And she sang. Beautifully.

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Where was I?

I hate it when people blog about their blogging, so I'll make this brief: Sorry I was AWOL last week. I had a terrible cold, and just didn't have the brain-power to blog. I barely kept the Facebook page running. Heck, for two days, I didn't even leave the bedroom. I'm mostly better.

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But I did get to watch a bunch of TV and movies, as well as do some fun reading.

First of all, I pretty much blasted through the rest of The Hunger Games, and then immediately downloaded Catching Fire.

Which I also blazed through (see what I did there?). And, of course, I immediately downloaded Mockingjay.

I'm about 60% through it, but since I'm better I have to spend my time reading boring old textbooks now. But once I'm all caught up with school reading (ha ha ha ha ha... I love that joke!), I'll get back to it. Or, maybe I'll use it as a reward for finishing a specific number of chapters in my textbooks. Yeah, I like that idea better.

So, to say I'm enjoying the series is an understatement! I love it. Admittedly, it's young adult fiction, so it's not "high art" but it is still a wonderful story. Very gripping. And even though there are too many times I really want to slap the fantastic strong female lead, Katniss, for being completely clueless, I remind myself she's a teenager, and that's why she doesn't catch on to things as quickly as the reader.

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When I finally ventured out of the bedroom, I spent a couple of hours staring at the television screen. Some of it I even remember.

First up, the Nun's Story, with the fabulous Audrey Hepburn.

 

OK, a story about a Belgian nun didn't hold too much promise, but I kept watching while I was busy working on a bit of easy homework I couldn't put off for being sick. About 20 minutes in I found myself watching it more than not, and mid-way through I decided this would be a great SRPS movie suggestion. Sure, she's a nun, but she's a feisty nun. And a smart nun. Plus, how often do we get to see such wonderful character stories about whole groups of women working in science and medicine, working in Africa, and eventually working to save the ill and wounded during the war. I don't want to spoil the ending, but it turns out just like I'd hoped.

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The next movie was Fiddler on the Roof, because I hadn't seen it in a long while. I love musicals. And although it's a complex, sad story, it actually always seems to cheer me up. I think it's just me. But I love how Tevye and Golde's relationship grows closer as they deal with their love-matches of their daughters.

Plus, all three older daughters completely shirk their societal expectations and marry for love. How is that not a prime characteristic of a self-rescuing princess?

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After being forced to return to class on Thursday, sooner than I was really ready, I regressed a bit and spent Friday back on the couch. Having pretty much exhausted the silly television shows and recorded movies, I dipped into my Netflix queue for a surprisingly sweet film, Arranged.

On the surface, this would look like just another looking-for-love movie, with the twist of being about two very religious young women. But looking past that, we see a touching story about unlikely friends. Rochel Meshenberg is an Orthodox Jew whose parents are done waiting for her to get married, and have hired a matchmaker (see the tie-in to Fiddler?) to find her a suitable Orthodox Jew for a husband.  Nasira Khaldi is a Muslim young woman whose parents are interviewing Muslim men for her. Their friendship develops as they work together in a local school, Nasira is a fourth-grade teacher, and Rochel is an aide for a visually-impaired student in her class.

They seem to come together naturally, while everyone around them seems to question their friendship. They have quite a bit in common, despite the obvious political differences. They are both comfortable in their beliefs. They have no urge to break away from their backgrounds and are quite happy in their lives. While Rochel questions whether she will ever find a husband worth having, Nasira helps her keep her hope alive, and even gives the matchmaker a bit of assistance.

Again, this was a movie I didn't have terribly high hopes for, and yet I was thoroughly enamored fewer than 10 minutes in. I highly recommend it. Self-rescuing princesses are sometimes old-fashioned and conservative -- strong in their beliefs and willing to be friends with people whose beliefs are different but equally strong.

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I also watched a lot of television, and not all of it silly. But that's for another post. Now, back to those dreary textbooks. Wish me luck.

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Weely Wrap-up

Some of the awesome things that I've seen over the last couple of days.

OK, not really the Hunger Games. I'm still reading it, I admit it. I'm sure it's clear by now I'm a slow reader. But this Lana Del Rey "Hunger Games" video is awesome (if a bit spoilerish):

Hillary Rosner writes about her experience with selling science stories to women's magazines:
Their So-Called Journalism, or What I Saw at the Women’s Mags

elle, phd has been running a great series for Black History Month, highlighting black women who deserve more recognition. So far: Addie Wyatt, Constance Baker Motley, and Maggie Lena Walker.

MadArtLab shared a great music love song for the Internet: Oh Internet -- A Love Song.

Sady Doyle writes about Occupy V-Day: All You Need (to Protest) Is Love

Betty White raps with electro dance artist Luciana, in their new music video "I'm Still Hot:"

Yes, Betty. You sure are!

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Amy Lowell

Doing my research for other birthdays for today, I came across an entry for Amy Lowell. I have to admit I've never heard of her before, but found myself reading her biography and looking for some of her poems.

According to the Wikipedia entry for her:

She never attended college because her family did not consider that proper for a woman, but she compensated with avid reading and near-obsessive book collecting.

She gave herself the education she was denied because of her sex:

She put herself through a "rigorous" reading program, using her father's 7,000-volume library and the resources of the Boston Athenaeum.

...

Perhaps Lowell's poetry was not sufficiently recognized during her lifetime, but she did write more than 650 poems, and she is now acknowledged as the first American woman poet to see herself as part of a feminine literary tradition, reflected in poems such as "The Sisters." What her contemporaries did realize was that Lowell made things happen for American poetry through her own innovations and her support of other poets.
(source: english.illinois.edu)

And, just in time for Valentine's Day, her poem Petals:

Petals

Life is a stream
On which we strew
Petal by petal the flower of our heart;
The end lost in dream,
They float past our view,
We only watch their glad, early start.
Freighted with hope,
Crimsoned with joy,
We scatter the leaves of our opening rose;
Their widening scope,
Their distant employ,
We never shall know. And the stream as it flows
Sweeps them away,
Each one is gone
Ever beyond into infinite ways.
We alone stay
While years hurry on,
The flower fared forth, though its fragrance still stays.

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Carole King

 
Today is Carole King's birthday. I think most people know her for her Tapestry album, which was ground-breaking and all that.

 But my most favorite Carole King album is Really Rosie, her collaborative effort with Maurice Sendak.

Strangely, I don't believe I'd ever seen it when it was broadcast in the mid-70s, but instead only discovered it in the early-90s when I was working with children at a Kansas women's shelter and was looking for something fun to play for them.

She's also quite well known for her songwriting repertoire.

And probably her best known hit for Aretha Franklin:

 
I just want to say thank you to Carole King for all the wonderful music over the years.

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Happy Birthday - Alice Walker

"And so our mothers and grandmothers have, more often than not anonymously, handed on the creative spark, the seed of the flower they themselves never hoped to see - or like a sealed letter they could not plainly read."

"Don't wait around for other people to be happy for you. Any happiness you get you've got to make yourself."

"The most common way people give up their power is by thinking they don't have any."

Happy birthday to one of my all-time most favorite writers, Alice Walker!

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Bethany Hamilton - Ultimate SRP!

Today is inspirational pro-surfer Bethany Hamilton's 22nd birthday. You may remember my post from last month about the movie Soul Surfer. This wasn't my first time learning about Bethany. I remember seeing stories about her immediately after her attack, and again later when she got back on the board and started competing again.

“Courage, sacrifice, determination, commitment, toughness,heart, talent, guts. That's what little girls are made of; the heck with sugar and spice.”

Happy birthday, Bethany!

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Elizabeth Bishop - Poet Laureate

All my life I have lived and behaved very much like the sandpiper - just running down the edges of different countries and continents, 'looking for something'. 

Elizabeth Bishop was born on February 8, 1911. During her childhood, she was pass around from family member to family member. When she reached adulthood, she received a large inheritance from her father, that enabled her to travel and live as she chose. She traveled, and she wrote poetry. In fact, she was the US Poet Laureate from 1949 to 1950, as well as the recipient of an impressive number of awards and fellowships.

I remember reading some of the works of Elizabeth Bishop in high school. Although her works are visually evocative, I was mostly inspired by her personal story (or the limited version of it we got in public school). Here was a woman who was independently wealthy, who was well-traveled, and who could practice her art unhindered. In the 1980s, there were plenty of examples of independently wealthy people who were squandering their time and talents, and here was a woman who did something productive.

It wasn't until later that I learned she was a lesbian and a feminist. Which knowledge only made me admire her more. Which makes me think she didn't have as easy a life as I had originally thought. When I read her biography, I learned that her lover had committed suicide, which makes me think she wasn't the happy-go-lucky woman I'd imagined her to be. Given this perspective, I appreciate her quiet, thoughtful poetry.

Her poems do not discuss the personal details of her life, but they do describe the intimate details. And, for me, it is this impersonal intimacy that I identify with most.Who doesn't have these similar longings?

I Am in Need of Music

I am in need of music that would flow
Over my fretful, feeling fingertips,
Over my bitter-tainted, trembling lips,
With melody, deep, clear, and liquid-slow.
Oh, for the healing swaying, old and low,
Of some song sung to rest the tired dead,
A song to fall like water on my head,
And over quivering limbs, dream flushed to glow!

There is a magic made by melody:
A spell of rest, and quiet breath, and cool
Heart, that sinks through fading colors deep
To the subaqueous stillness of the sea,
And floats forever in a moon-green pool,
Held in the arms of rhythm and of sleep.

Happy birthday, Elizabeth Bishop.

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Kate Chopin

Yesterday I blogged about Laura Ingalls Wilder and how she has influenced so many young women through the years, but I admitted that I had never read her books (or at least don't hold a memory of them), nor watched the show very often.

Today's birthday shout-out goes to another writer. In, again, in this case, I haven't read many of her works. But the one piece I have read, I've read several times.

It's a difficult read. It's an intimate look into the depths of depression and despair. Edna Pontellier is a woman who has everything she should want: a husband, beautiful children, a lovely home, social status, wealth -- and the knowledge that she is expected to be thankful for them all.

But she isn't. She's lonely and unstimulated. She has feelings she can't explain, or explore.

The mother-women seemed to prevail that summer at Grand Isle. It was easy to know them, fluttering about with extended, protecting wings when any harm, real or imaginary, threatened their precious brood. They were women who idolized their children, worshiped their husbands, and esteemed it a holy privilege to efface themselves as individuals and grow wings as ministering angels.

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The voice of the sea is seductive; never ceasing, whispering, clearing, murmuring, inviting the soul to wander for a spell in the abysses of solitude; to lose itself in mazes of inward contemplation. The voice of the sea speaks to the soul. The touch of the sea is sensuous, enfolding the body in its soft, close embrace.

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It sometimes entered Mr. Pontellier's mind to wonder if his wife were not growing a little unbalanced mentally. He could see plainly that she was not herself. That is, he could not see that she was becoming herself and daily casting aside that fictitious self which we would assume like a garment with which to appear before the world.

The book has always been an emotional read for me. I have my own personal darkness to contend with at times, and while it's sometimes helpful to read about other people's lives, this book is particularly difficult when I'm not feeling very strong.

And it's made more difficult by its association with probably my most favorite character in the show Treme.

 But as well as I know the book, I know very little about Kate Chopin's life. I suspect there was some part of her life in Awakening.

What little I've read over the last day or so, looking for photos and whatnot for this post, I realize I would like to read more of her work, and one or two of the biographies written about her. I suspect I would find some inspiration in learning about her life, and how she faced her challenges.

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Pioneer Princess

145 years ago, on February 7, 1867,  Laura Ingalls was born in the "Big Woods" in Wisconsin. But she's best known for her time living on the Kansas prairie. Her story has always resonated with me. She was so brave -- she is one of the strong women I try to emulate.

Did you read the Little House books when you were younger?

Or maybe watch the television show?

I remember watching the shows off and on, but never really got into them. And I don't have any memories of reading the books at all. Which doesn't mean I didn't read them. I have a terrible memory for books. And I read similar books, like Caddie Woodlawn and Anne of Green Gables, which makes me think I at least read a couple.

That said, I have a great fondness for my idea of them. And I know I bought the romance of frontier living. I loved daydreaming of living in a cabin and being completely self-sufficient. Heck, I still have that dream from time to time.

When I was in college (the first time), my parents moved to Kansas. During my breaks, we would travel around the state visiting historic sites and points of interest. But we never made it to the replica house showing where the Ingalls family lived when they were in Kansas.

I am intrigued by the longevity of these novels. I believe they have made a resurgence in popularity with the movement to return to a simpler way of living - crafts, sewing, gardening, preserving, etc.

I have long thought about reading the entire series. I imagine there is plenty of inspiration for young women, and girls. And it would certainly fit in with my goal toward more sustainable living. Maybe I'll make my goal between now and her 150th birthday in five years.

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SRPS History - Empress Matilda

Speaking of English queens, 910 years ago today, Empress Matilda was born.

There are plenty of history sites telling of her life. What I've always been impressed with was her audacity to fight for her rule.

The inscription on Matilda's tomb at Rouen, France, read: "Here lies Henry's daughter, wife and mother; great by birth, greater by marriage, but greatest in motherhood." The tomb inscription does not tell the whole story, however. The Empress Matilda (or Empress Maud) is best known in history for the civil war sparked by her fight against her cousin, Stephen, to win the throne of England for herself and her descendants.
(source: about.com)

Her life starts out in the typical way for royal daughters: she has royal parents (in her case, her father was Henry I of England), who want to secure allegiances with other royals, and so marry their children (particularly their daughters) off to the best candidate to ensure peace and prosperity. Or just prosperity.

In her case, she was betrothed by the age of 7, married by the age of 12, and widowed by the age of 23. She and her husband, Henry V,  Holy Roman Emperor, had no children, so she was then married off again, only this time to a lowly count.

She was her father's sole surviving legitimate child. (Her brother, William Adelin died in November 1120, when he was 17 years old, when the White Ship sank. This is the story alluded to in Ken Follett's novel, The Pillars of the Earth.)

Before his death, her father proclaimed Matilda to be his heir, and had all his barons swear fealty. But after his death, her cousin Stephen of Blois rushed around England, building support to usurp her, rallying various forces, and quickly had himself crowned king. He even got the blessing of the Pope. Likely, those barons who swore their fealty did not relish the idea of a woman ruler, and were more than happy to go back on their promises. Especially once the pope absolved them of their oaths to the dead king.

Matilda rallied her own forces and fought Stephen for many years, taking back all of Normandy, and eventually returning to England to fight there. After another several years of war, and reclaiming several castles, defeats, retreats, victories and the standard chess game that was war in the 12th century, she found herself surrounded, and it looked grim.

In December 1142, Matilda was trapped in Oxford Castle, and besieged. She made a daring and renowned escape across ice and snow at night, and evaded Stephen’s army. A year later, she also had to escape from Devizes Castle, this time disguised as a body being taken for burial.

In 1147, she finally quit the warring and returned to Normandy. But she wasn't done fighting.  Her son, Henry II, now Duke of Normandy, was her new hope, and she instilled in him his claim to the throne.

In the interest of peace, Stephen finally brokered a treaty with Matilda, and agreed to name Henry II as his heir, thus ensuring the progression of her line, even if she never quite sat on the throne herself.

In addition to a brief appearance in Follett's book, there are several good works historical fiction about Matilda. I've heard good things about Lady of the English, by Elizabeth Chadwick. I'm intrigued, and since I absolutely adore historical fiction, I may have to check it out.

Have you read it? What did you think?

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Queen for a Day, or a bit longer

Today, Queen Elizabeth 2 marks 60 years on the throne, with a 62 gun salute, tree planting, and other festivities.

The Telegraph.uk.com had a nice story about it:

They also have a special section with articles about and photos of Her Majesty.

She also issued this statement:

Today, as I mark 60 years as your Queen, I am writing to thank you for the wonderful support and encouragement that you have given to me and Prince Philip over these years and to tell you how deeply moved we have been to receive so many kind messages about the Diamond Jubilee.

In this special year, as I dedicate myself anew to your service, I hope we will all be reminded of the power of togetherness and the convening strength of family, friendship and good neighbourliness, examples of which I have been fortunate to see throughout my reign and which my family and I look forward to seeing in many forms as we travel throughout the United Kingdom and the wider Commonwealth.

I hope also that this Jubilee year will be a time to give thanks for the great advances that have been made since 1952 and to look forward to the future with clear head and warm heart as we join together in our celebrations.

I send my sincere good wishes to you all.

Right back at you, your highness!

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Swiss women and the vote: History I didn't know I didn't know.

I was cruising around the web this morning, doing some research for my Women's History Month blogging idea, and came across this a wikipedia page claiming that Swiss women hadn't been able to vote until 1971. My first reaction was, What?! I don't believe that for one minute!

So I did the next logical thing, and did a Google search for "swiss suffrage," and was shocked to learn it was true. (I mean, I didn't actually suspect wikipedia was wrong, I just couldn't accept it that easily.)

There are a number of good sources that came up, so I accept that it is true. I'm still shocked, though.

The BBC News site "On This Day" gives the news of the day 41 years ago when Swiss women finally got the ability to vote. But even with that right finally made available, they still had a long way to go, baby.

Although Swiss women can now vote in most regional and national elections, they continue to face discrimination under Swiss law.

At home, men retain control of their wives' property and capital, and the husband has the right to decide where he and his wife will reside.

There's a good audio report on the World Radio Switzerland site, giving a good history and current state of woman's suffrage in the country.

And swissinfo.ch has a great story honoring Marthe Gosteli, a tireless leader for suffrage for Swiss women, and gives a bit more history on the matter.

It took 50 votes – all decided by men – before Switzerland finally allowed women to vote in 1971, one of the last European countries to do so. Gosteli said a lot of work had been done to convince people of the merits of the change.

But opponents had carried out a fierce campaign, using rather crude posters to warn of the “perils” of women voting.

Gosteli said that she was surprised at just how many educated women took part in the “no” campaign, despite the fact that “they had only been able to study thanks to the early women’s movement”.

Women’s suffrage 40 years ago was an important milestone. But the whole fight was exhausting and Gosteli found that even when she learned of the positive result, “it was a relief but I was not jumping around for joy”.

“I was simply happy that we had won.”

She was asked why modern Swiss women don't vote. Her reason?

Gosteli believes the lack of interest of young women today in the history of the women’s movement doesn’t come from them simply taking equal rights for granted. Nor does she believe that they lack self-confidence.

“It’s more that there is an catastrophic education deficit concerning women’s issues,” she said.

“Education is the key,” points out Gosteli. This is why her Gosteli foundation this year published a brochure about the history of the women’s movement which can be used in secondary schools.

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SRPS Shout-out: Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence

 

I had to go the pharmacy today (to pick up something* made by previous SRPS shout-out recipient Gertrude Elion), and this is the wondrous sight I found there! I can't even tell what their costumes are, other than AWESOME!

Of course, I had to check it out, right? Wouldn't you? I should also add, there were baked goods, and I hadn't had breakfast yet.

Turns out, it was a couple of members of the Russian River Chapter of the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence -- a group I had never heard of until today, and wish I had known about all these years!

Now I'm seriously angling to get out to their up-coming Mardi Gras fundraiser!

Looking at the flyer they handed me, they do a lot of good around the Russian River area of Sonoma County. Such a wide range of organizations. 

I need to learn more about them!

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Another Double Hitter: SRPS Movie Review and Shout-out.

I just love this movie so much! 20 years later, and it still holds up. I loved baseball when I was growing up in Louisiana and East Texas, and enjoyed spending a rare quite Saturday afternoon with my dad watching the Astros on TV. We even went to a game when we visited Houston. When we moved to Michigan, I changed my allegiance to the Tigers, naturally. In Kansas City, I followed the Royals. And now that I'm in Northern California, I'm a Giants fan.

But, really, I'm a baseball fan. I love the sound of a baseball game being broadcast on the radio or TV. I love the sounds of the crowd and the game. I love the suspense. I love the slow, meditative pace of a game, with short bursts of excitement, and lots of strategy. 

Even at a young age, I was pretty aware that things were different for girls and boys. I don't think I ever harbored any unrealistic ambition of being a professional baseball player, like I'm sure many boys my age did. I remember asking my mom why there weren't any baseball players who were women. In fact, in the 1970s, it was pretty rare to find girls playing Little League.  She didn't really have a good answer. I don't remember what it was exactly, but I'm sure it was yet another lesson in gender expectations and inequality.

I never heard anything about the All-American Girls Professional Baseball League. I don't know if she had ever heard of them either. 

When the movie A League of Their Own came out in 1992, I went to see it and fell in love. It was the first time I had ever heard of women playing professional sports other than the ones we see in the Olympics (tennis, figure skating, etc.). Which is surprising to me now, seeing as how the AAGPBL was active for a decade (1943 to 1954). How could something that was, according to all the stories I read about it now, so popular be completely missing from our collective memory in the 1970s and 80s? Or was it just not known in my little corner of the world?

The movie is a fictionalized account of the first season, and seems to hold true to the general story. Although it's a movie about baseball players, it's not necessarily about baseball so much as about the story of how the league came into being and the experiences of the individual women in the story, especially the sisters Dottie Hinson (played by Geena Davis, whom I adore) and Kit Keller (played by Lori Petty), who have a strong bond but also a healthy dose of sibling rivalry. Originally placed on the same team, because of an argument that makes Dottie consider leaving the league, Kit is traded to a rival team. Of course, the movie puts both teams in the World Series game, and the last at bat brings Kit to the plate where Dottie is catcher. It's a suspenseful scene.

There are some remarkable performances in this film. Tom Hanks as the coach, screaming, "There's no crying in baseball!" Madonna and Rosie O'Donnell as two feisty friends. John Lovitz as the scout. So many great scenes. So many great lines. It's not a perfect movie, but it's a fun story. And I love these ensemble casts of women. The characters are complex and whole people, not props. 

This is a movie I make it a point to watch at least once a year. Usually when I get Spring Training Fever in early February, when I pull out all my baseball movies, getting excited about the coming season. And I see something new each time I watch it.

So, when I learned that February 2 is Doris Sams' birthday, I had to move up the re-viewing to make it happen for a shout-out for her.

I don't claim to have known anything about her, or her record, before this week when I saw her listed on a Wikipedia page for birthdays.

According to the Baseball Almanac biography, written by Jim Sargent:

Following the circuit's 1947 season, Sammye's second year, she was selected as the AAGPBL's Player of the Year. A pitcher turned outfielder, she was named to the league's all-star team at both positions. No other player in the history of the AAGPBL accomplished that unique feat.

The Society for American Baseball Research biography, also written by Jim Sargent (actually, it looks like a longer version of the article on BaseballAlmanac.com):

When fans, readers, and baseball enthusiasts consider the fine All-Americans who performed in consistently excellent fashion year in and year out, Doris Sams will be remembered among the best in the league's storied history. Considering her all-around athletic skills, including her accomplishments at the plate and on the mound as well as her down-home personality and widespread popularity, the Knoxville great deserved to be selected among Total Baseball's top twenty players. Indeed, Sammye's popularity in her adopted hometowns of Muskegon and Kalamazoo helps illustrate the glory of hundreds of All-American women who played a high level of baseball on their own fields of dreams in the 1940s and early 1950s.

I would have loved to have known about Doris Sams and the other professional womens baseball players when I was a girl! No telling how I would have used that info. I wasn't especially athletically inclined, but it certainly would have been inspirational anyway. I'm sure I would have devoured biographies about women ball players if I had found any, the same way I read through every book I could find on Amelia Earhart.

I just hope there are lots of little girls out there who ARE learning about professional women's baseball, and other professional women's sports, and are inspired to pursue their dreams. Of course, it's up to us adults to make sure they know about them, and to support them in their goals.

Happy Birthday Doris "Sammye" Sams!

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SRPS Movie Night: Pray the Devil Back to Hell; and a Shout-Out to Leymah Gbowee

Original Artwork: Olaf Hajek  Poster Design: PrettyCo

I had originally intended to post this review earlier this week, but when I went to find a photo of Leymah Gbowee, I learned that today, February 1, is her birthday, so I decided to postpone it for a few days, and make this a combined movie review and shout-out.

I remember hearing a little about the women's efforts in Liberia several years ago, and then again when Ellen Johnson Sirleaf was elected president of Liberia, and the first female head of state of any African country.

And, again, this subject came up last year when both Leymah Gbowee and Ellen Johnson Sirleaf won the Nobel Prize for peace (along with Tawakel Karman of Yemen) "for their non-violent struggle for the safety of women and for women's rights to full participation in peace-building work."

I have to admit that I wasn't that involved in the goings on of Liberia, and didn't pay very close attention to what had been happening there prior to the women's actions, or much after. I heard about the atrocities, and when the stories about "blood diamonds" were going around, I wasn't surprised to hear that Liberia was involved with that. 

But, other than that, the only thing I knew about Liberia is that it was the country formed by former slaves.

So, when I was at the library last week returning books, and saw this DVD, I checked it out and watched it that night. And rewatched it the next day. And then watched the extra features, which includes an in-depth interview from the Bill Moyer's Journal.

It was a difficult documentary to watch. The war in Liberia was a terrible event, and largely ignored by most people outside of Liberia. It was filled with horrors -- rape, brutal killings and mutilations, starvation, loss, poverty, disease. The civil war had been raging for over a decade by the time Leymah Gbowee formed the Christian Womens' Initiative, which eventually joined forces with Muslim women, and became the group known as the Liberian Mass Action for Peace. 

As she explains in the documentary, after working with different programs calling for peace and rehabilitation of youth soldiers, she realized it was going to have to be the women who would bring the country out of the darkness of war, and she started holding meetings with different women's groups. There is footage of her giving a moving speech at a church, where she expresses the exhaustion of the women of Liberia:

We are tired of war. We are tired of running. We are tired of begging for bulgur wheat. We are tired of our children being raped. We are now taking this stand, to secure the future of our children. Because we believe, as custodians of society, tomorrow our children will ask us, "Mama, what was your role during the crisis?"

But it is the images of the women protesting that are the most moving. They made it a point to wear white, and to be as visible as possible every single day of the war. Their gathering was prohibited, but they met anyway. And they made sure to pick a location that the tyrannical warlord-turned-president, Charles Taylor, traveled daily.

Liberian women demonstrate at the American Embassy in Monrovia at the
height of the civil war in July 2003. Photo Credit: Pewee Flomoku

They eventually had enough of a presence in the media that gave them the power to convince Charles Taylor to attend peace talks in Ghana. But, in order to make sure he and the other warlords would actually sign a deal, many of the women also went to Ghana, at great personal expense and danger, to protest the meetings. At one point, they surrounded the meetings and refused to allow the warlords to leave, and even threatened to strip naked to shame them men. According to Gbowee: 

In Africa, it's a terrible curse to see a married or elderly woman deliberately bare herself.

Eventually, a peace deal was reached, and the war finally ended. Charles Taylor resigned and was forced to take refuge in Nigeria. The efforts of the women's groups went into getting Ellen Johnson Sirleaf elected, and toward the healing of the nation. Which would be no easy task.

A whole generation of young men had no idea who they were without a gun in their hands. Several generations of women were widowed, had been raped, seen their daughters and mothers raped, and their children kill and be killed. Neighbors had turned against neighbors; young people had lost hope, and old people, everything they had painstakingly earned. To a person, we were traumatized.

Gbowee did not come through the war and peace efforts unscathed. Her post-peace work took its toll on her long-term relationship. She turned to drinking to help deal with the stresses of being separated from her family and working so hard. It wasn't until she saw the fear of her own children at the thought of losing their mother that she stopped drinking.

She now works with different philanthropic organizations and gives public lectures about her experiences. 

I highly recommend watching this documentary and the accompanying interviews, as well as pretty much any other videos you can find online. She is an elegant, strong, brave woman, and, in my opinion, the embodiment of a self-rescuing princess.

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