March is Women's History Month!!!!

[Kobi]

Jane Bolin was the first black woman judge in the United States. Born April 11, 1908 in Poughkeepsie, New York, Bolin always knew she wanted to be a lawyer. Her father, Gaius Bolin, the first African American graduate of Williams College, practiced law in Poughkeepsie. Bolin graduated from Wellesley College in 1928, and received her law degree from Yale University School of Law in 1931

[Kobi]

Frances Perkins was the U.S. Secretary of Labor from 1933 to 1945, and the first woman appointed to the U.S. Cabinet. As a loyal supporter of her friend, Franklin D. Roosevelt, she helped pull the labor movement into the New Deal coalition.

Frances Perkins, had an unenviable challenge: she had to be as capable, as fearless, as tactful, as politically astute as the other Washington politicians, in order to make it possible for other women to be accepted into the halls of power after her.

Perkins would have been famous simply by being the first woman cabinet member, but her legacy stems from her accomplishments. She was largely responsible for the U.S. adoption of social security, unemployment insurance, federal laws regulating child labor, and adoption of the federal minimum wage.

Perkins had a cool personality, which held her aloof from the crowd. Although her results indicate her great love of workers and lower-class groups, her Boston upbringing held her back from mingling freely and exhibiting personal affection. She was well-suited for the high-level efforts to effect sweeping reforms, but never caught the public's eye or its affection.

The Frances Perkins Building that is the headquarters of the U.S. Department of Labor in Washington, D.C. was named in her honor in 1980.

Perkins remains a prominent alumna of Mount Holyoke College, whose Francis Perkins Program allows "women of non-traditional age" (i.e., age 24 or older) to complete a Bachelor of Arts degree. There are approximately 140 Francis Perkins scholars each year.

[Kobi]

1655 Elizabeth Key Grinstead, who was a slave in Virginia, won her freedom in a lawsuit based on her father's status as a free Englishman (her mother was a slave and her father was her mother's owner), helped by the fact that her father had baptized her as Christian in the Church of England.

However, in 1662 the Virginia House of Burgesses passed a law stating that any child born in the colony would follow the status of its mother, slave or free.

This was an overturn of a long held principle of English Common Law, whereby a child's status followed that of the father; it enabled white men who raped slave women to hide the mixed-race children born as a result and removed their responsibility to acknowledge, support, or emancipate those children.

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In March 1776, Abigail Adams wrote to her husband John Adams, who was rounding up support in Congress for a declaration of independence, recommending- "In the new code of laws which I suppose it will be necessary for you to make, I desire you would remember the ladies and be more generous and favorable to them than your ancestors. Do not put such unlimited power into the hands of the husbands."

Her husband wrote back, "As to your extraordinary code of laws, I cannot but laugh...Depend upon it, we know better than to repeal our masculine systems."

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Coverture (sometimes spelled couverture) was a legal doctrine whereby, upon marriage, a woman's legal rights were subsumed by those of her husband. Coverture was enshrined in the common law of England and the United States throughout most of the 19th century.

Under traditional English common law an adult unmarried woman was considered to have the legal status of feme sole, while a married woman had the status of feme covert.

A feme sole had the right to own property and make contracts in her own name.

A feme covert was not recognized as having legal rights and obligations distinct from those of her husband in most respects. Instead, through marriage a woman's existence was incorporated into that of her husband, so that she had very few recognized individual rights of her own.

As it has been pithily expressed, husband and wife were one person as far as the law was concerned, and that person was the husband. A married woman could not own property, sign legal documents or enter into a contract, obtain an education against her husband's wishes, or keep a salary for herself. If a wife was permitted to work, under the laws of coverture she was required to relinquish her wages to her husband. In certain cases, a woman did not have individual legal liability for her misdeeds, since it was legally assumed that she was acting under the orders of her husband, and generally a husband and wife were not allowed to testify either for or against each other. Judges and lawyers referred to the overall principle as "coverture".

Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Susan B. Anthony's first legislative victory came in 1860, when the New York State Legislature passed the Married Woman's Property Act, which gave a wife the right to keep her earnings, own property, share custody of her children, and sue in a court of law. Women in other states began pressuring their legislatures to pass similar measures.
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[Kobi]

Lillian Moller Gilbreth (1878 – 1972) Industrial Engineer. Patented the famous trash can with a foot-pedal lid-opener. First women elected to the National Academy of Engineering. Interviewed over 4,000 women while working at General Electrics to design the proper height for stoves, sinks, and other kitchen fixtures.


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Bettie Page: An American pinup model from the '50s who has been called the "Queen of Pinups." Why she's scandalous: Besides being one of the earliest Playmates of the Month for Playboy magazine (Miss January 1955), Bettie Page was famous for her fetish and sadomasochistic modeling. In fact, she's considered the first famous bondage model.

[Gentle Tiger]

You cannot say you celebrate life and not celebrate Women.
Here's to You!

[The_Lady_Snow]

[Kobi]

Dori J. Maynard (1958-2015)

SAN FRANCISCO (AP) - When Dori J. Maynard was asked what her middle initial "J'' stood for, she didn't miss a beat in answering.

"Journalism," she replied.

Her middle name was really Judith, but the response was still appropriate. For Maynard, journalism wasn't just a part of her life, it was her life.

Maynard, president of the Robert C. Maynard institute for Journalism Education in Oakland and longtime champion of diversity in journalism and civic life, died Tuesday at her West Oakland home from complications from lung cancer. She was 56.

Because of Maynard's work, the "Fault Lines" concept of diversity is taught at many U.S. journalism schools and is used as a framework in newsrooms across America, said retired, former Los Angeles Times editor Frank O. Sotomayor. First developed by her late father, Robert C. Maynard, a trailblazing journalist, it was Dori Maynard who spent years holding training sessions and spreading the message tha t diversity is not only about race and ethnicity, but also gender, class, age, generation, geographical location, sexual orientation, religion and political views.

More than anything, friends and colleagues said, Dori Maynard was a teacher.

"She was a journalist. She was a storyteller. She was a business woman. She was a thought leader," said Martin G. Reynolds, senior editor for community engagement at the Bay Area News Group and a Maynard Institute board member. "But when you peel all of that back, really, she was a teacher. She was trying to teach an industry about something that was important for it to do its job. I think the best teachers are people who can connect and make people feel as though they are important and their views and values are being heard."

Bob Butler, president of the National Association of Black Journalists, said Maynard advocated tirelessly for the future of the institute and its programs, reminding everyone that the work of bringing the diverse voices of America into news and public discourse is more vital than ever.

"Under her leadership, the Institute has trained some of the top journalists in the country and helped newsrooms tell more inclusive and nuanced stories," he said.

The daughter of former Oakland Tribune owner and publisher Robert C. Maynard, the first African-American man to own a major U.S. newspaper, Maynard knew from an early age she wanted a life as a journalist.

"Her father was a huge influence on her, and I think his legacy influenced her so much," said Reynolds, who called Maynard one of his best friends. "His values of what a newspaper should be and reflect were commandments for her and her approach to her work. It was so much of who she was."

After graduating from Middlebury College in Vermont with a bachelor's degree in American history, she went on to work at the Detroit Free Press, the Bakersfield Californian, and The Patriot Ledger, in Quincy, Massachusetts. She was a Nieman fellow at Harvard University in 1993.

- See more at: http://www.legacy.com/obituaries/bos....kDmKe9wc.dpuf