04-07-95 Women of Achievement and Herstory

Some notable women whose birthdates I don't have:
      Bessie Abramowitz organized the Amalgamated Clothing Workers of
America and was probably the first woman to sign a collective
bargaining agreement to settle a labor dispute.  She had started small
by leading a few of her sister seamstresses out on strike protesting
poor working conditions and wages.  That strike eventually grew to
20,000 workers and she was chosen by the union members as their
arbitrator.
      Anna Pedersdotter Absalon - one of the most renowned Norwegian
women writers of the Renaissance, who was burned as a witch in 1590. 
John Masefield turned a description of her into the play _The Witch_
(1926) which ran for a long time on the New York and London stages. 
      A noted theologian (Roland H. Bainton writing in _Women of the
Reformation, From Spain to Scandinavia_.  Minneapolis: Augsburg
Publishing House, 1977.  ISBN: 0-8066-1568-0.) pointed out that all 35
witnesses against Absalon were women.  He also discounts the claims
that women were burned as witches because they were women, asking
"Was this feminine anti-feminism?"  (Feminism in 1590? Why does he
equate feminism with witch burning?)
      However, he forgets that he earlier wrote that her husband and
the Bishop were too entrenched to be removed, so authorities got at
them by charging their wives with witchcraft.  Also, that the testifying
women were controlled by their men and faced starvation or beatings,
or worse - such as being charged as witches - if they failed to obey
their husbands' orders. 

04-07 Anniversaries ...............................................

      B. 04-07-1890, Marjory Stoneman Douglas, author, conservationist,
especially for the Florida Everglades, wrote _The Everglades: River of
Grass_ (1947) probably the most influential book in Florida's history. It
forced the establishment of the Central and South Florida Flood Control
that kept the Everglades River system viable. I can proudly say that
while a newspaper reporter in Broward County, I discovered a sleazy
land sales scheme that used a loophole to sell land in that flood
control/river district.  I exposed it and pressured the Florida Land
Sales Commission to force him to return the investors money.  Marjory
Stoneman Douglas was a fabulous woman!  She tried so hard to save the
real Florida.  

      B. 04-07-1891, Dr. Martha May Eliot, first woman president of the
American Public Health Association (1947), active in UNESCO, and made
great contributions to child care regulations.

Quotes du jour ...............................................

      "Why are women listed as a "minority"?  According to the U.S.
Census Bureau, there are more females than males." - Dave Powers,
Syracuse, NY
      Marilyn vos Savant wrote the following reply in her column in
_Parade Magazine_:
      "The earliest and predominant meaning of "minority" is "the
condition of being smaller, inferior, or subordinate."  This is the origin
of the word, "minor" when referring to a person under legal age.  Even
if there are more of them in number, they're still minors.  And, as
there's no doubt that women have always been subordinate, they are
clearly a "minority" group.
      "If it were solely number that defined the term, we would call
Caucasians a minority because there are fewer of them in the world
than, say, Asians."


(C) 1995 Irene Stuber, PO Box 6185, Hot Springs National Park, AR
71902, irenestuber@delphi.com. Distribute verbatim copies freely with
copyright notice for non-profit use. Don't let anyone tell you there
weren't notable and effective women throughout history.  They were
always there, but historians failed to note them in our histories so that
each generation of women has had to reinvent themselves.