Richmond, VA is turning over a new leaf. The former seat of the Confederacy, renowned for honoring men and war, is erecting 12 statues of women, most of whom I’ve never heard of. And that’s the point. Until recently women’s history was practically an oxymoron. That is changing. In contrast to New York City, which […]
women's rights
Black women’s rights pioneers deserve more credit
A new statue honoring women will debut in New York City sometime soon, but it will depict the old standbys: Susan B. Anthony and Elizabeth Cady Stanton. Not that there’s anything wrong with these women. It’s just that there are so many other early women’s rights advocates who could use the publicity, particularly women of […]
Center for Great Women opening in Seneca Falls
This year, the new Center for Great Women will take up residence in the historic Seneca Falls Knitting Mill in Seneca Falls, NY. Next year marks the centennial anniversary of U.S. women’s right to vote, so it’s prime time to visit this western New York town, birthplace of the women’s rights movement in the United […]
She must have read my book!
Rebecca Edwards, who began a stint as a Dutchess County, New York legislator this year, must have read A Shocking & Unnatural Incident. Why else would she know that the early women’s rights movement wasn’t just about suffrage? Just kidding. Edwards writes a detailed account of What Women Want (since nearly the origin of women) […]
Best dressed congresswoman offered 1st equal pay bill
Ever hear of Winifred Stanley? The first person to introduce equal pay legislation in Congress? Me neither, but a recent Washington Post article changed that. Rep. Winifred C. Stanley was a Buffalo, NY, Republican, who gained a congressional seat on a $6 campaign budget. Despite a successful career as a tough prosecutor who won the […]
Casual shopping helped spur right to vote
Here’s a shocker: Shopping, that decidedly female pastime of perusing consumer goods with or without the intent to purchase, was actually a catalyst for the women’s rights movement. Erika Diane Rappaport writes in Shopping for Pleasure that “for many middle-class housewives in Victorian England, shopping was their first taste of real freedom, and the starting […]
