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#Women's History
usnatarchives · 16 hours
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⚾ Before #WWII, women played #baseball in junior and minor leagues throughout the United States. In 1930, Universal News highlighted a "All-Girls Teams in Slug-fest," a game played between Niles and Oakland. ⚾
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liberaljane · 22 days
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Women's Not So Distant History
This #WomensHistoryMonth, let's not forget how many of our rights were only won in recent decades, and weren’t acquired by asking nicely and waiting. We need to fight for our rights. Here's are a few examples:
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📍 Before 1974's Fair Credit Opportunity Act made it illegal for financial institutions to discriminate against applicants' gender, banks could refuse women a credit card. Women won the right to open a bank account in the 1960s, but many banks still refused without a husband’s signature. This allowed men to continue to have control over women’s bank accounts. Unmarried women were often refused service by financial institutions entirely.
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📍 Before 1977, sexual harassment was not considered a legal offense. That changed when a woman brought her boss to court after she refused his sexual advances and was fired. The court stated that her termination violated the 1974 Civil Rights Act, which made employment discrimination illegal.⚖️
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📍 In 1969, California became the first state to pass legislation to allow no-fault divorce. Before then, divorce could only be obtained if a woman could prove that her husband had committed serious faults such as adultery. 💍By 1977, nine states had adopted no-fault divorce laws, and by late 1983, every state had but two. The last, New York, adopted a law in 2010.
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📍In 1967, Kathrine Switzer, entered the Boston Marathon under the name "K.V. Switzer." At the time, the Amateur Athletics Union didn't allow women. Once discovered, staff tried to remove Switzer from the race, but she finished. AAU did not formally accept women until fall 1971.
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📍 In 1972, Lillian Garland, a receptionist at a California bank, went on unpaid leave to have a baby and when she returned, her position was filled. Her lawsuit led to 1978's Pregnancy Discrimination Act, which found that discriminating against pregnant people is unlawful
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📍 It wasn’t until 2016 that gay marriage was legal in all 50 states. Previously, laws varied by state, and while many states allowed for civil unions for same-sex couples, it created a separate but equal standard. In 2008, California was the first state to achieve marriage equality, only to reverse that right following a ballot initiative later that year. 
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📍In 2018, Utah and Idaho were the last two states that lacked clear legislation protecting chest or breast feeding parents from obscenity laws. At the time, an Idaho congressman complained women would, "whip it out and do it anywhere,"
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📍 In 1973, the Supreme Court affirmed the right to safe legal abortion in Roe v. Wade. At the time of the decision, nearly all states outlawed abortion with few exceptions. In 1965, illegal abortions made up one-sixth of all pregnancy- and childbirth-related deaths. Unfortunately after years of abortion restrictions and bans, the Supreme Court overturned Roe in 2022. Since then, 14 states have fully banned care, and another 7 severely restrict it – leaving most of the south and midwest without access. 
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📍 Before 1973, women were not able to serve on a jury in all 50 states. However, this varied by state: Utah was the first state to allow women to serve jury duty in 1898. Though, by 1927, only 19 states allowed women to serve jury duty. The Civil Rights Act of 1957 gave women the right to serve on federal juries, though it wasn't until 1973 that all 50 states passed similar legislation
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📍 Before 1988, women were unable to get a business loan on their own. The Women's Business Ownership Act of 1988 allowed women to get loans without a male co-signer and removed other barriers to women in business. The number of women-owned businesses increased by 31 times in the last four decades. 
Free download
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📍 Before 1965, married women had no right to birth control. In Griswold v. Connecticut (1965), the Supreme Court ruled that banning the use of contraceptives violated the right to marital privacy.
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📍 Before 1967, interracial couples didn’t have the right to marry. In Loving v. Virginia, the Supreme Court found that anti-miscegenation laws were unconstitutional. In 2000, Alabama was the last State to remove its anti-miscegenation laws from the books.
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📍 Before 1972, unmarried women didn’t have the right to birth control. While married couples gained the right in 1967, it wasn’t until Eisenstadt v. Baird seven years later, that the Supreme Court affirmed the right to contraception for unmarried people.
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📍 In 1974, the last “Ugly Laws” were repealed in Chicago. “Ugly Laws” allowed the police to arrest and jail people with visible disabilities for being seen in public. People charged with ugly laws were either charged a fine or held in jail. ‘Ugly Laws’ were a part of the late 19th century Victorian Era poor laws. 
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📍 In 1976, Hawaii was the last state to lift requirements that a woman take her husband’s last name.  If a woman didn’t take her husband’s last name, employers could refuse to issue her payroll and she could be barred from voting. 
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📍 It wasn’t until 1993 that marital assault became a crime in all 50 states. Historically, intercourse within marriage was regarded as a “right” of spouses. Before 1974, in all fifty U.S. states, men had legal immunity for assaults their wives. Oklahoma and North Carolina were the last to change the law in 1993.
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📍  In 1990, the Americans with Disability Act (ADA) – most comprehensive disability rights legislation in U.S. history – was passed. The ADA protected disabled people from employment discrimination. Previously, an employer could refuse to hire someone just because of their disability.
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📍 Before 1993, women weren’t allowed to wear pants on the Senate floor. That changed when Sen. Moseley Braun (D-IL), & Sen. Barbara Mikulski (D-MD) wore trousers - shocking the male-dominated Senate. Their fashion statement ultimately led to the dress code being clarified to allow women to wear pants. 
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📍 Emergency contraception (Plan B) wasn't approved by the FDA until 1998. While many can get emergency contraception at their local drugstore, back then it required a prescription. In 2013, the FDA removed age limits & allowed retailers to stock it directly on the shelf (although many don’t).
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📍  In Lawrence v. Texas (2003), the Supreme Court ruled that anti-cohabitation laws were unconstitutional. Sometimes referred to as the ‘'Living in Sin' statute, anti-cohabitation laws criminalize living with a partner if the couple is unmarried. Today, Mississippi still has laws on its books against cohabitation. 
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psikonauti · 11 months
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California’s first woman structural engineer, Ruth Gordon Schnapp, 1970s
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city-of-ladies · 30 days
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"Dr Sarah Stark, a human skeletal biologist at Historic England, said the findings provided “evidence of a leading role for a woman in warfare on iron age Scilly.”
“Although we can never know completely about the symbolism of objects found in graves, the combination of a sword and a mirror suggests this woman had high status within her community and may have played a commanding role in local warfare, organising or leading raids on rival groups.”
Stark added: “This could suggest that female involvement in raiding and other types of violence was more common in iron age society than we’ve previously thought, and it could have laid the foundations from which leaders like Boudicca would later emerge.”"
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nesyanast · 5 months
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On November 23, 1909, more than twenty thousand Jewish Yiddish-speaking immigrants, mostly young women in their teens and early twenties, launched an eleven-week general strike in New York’s shirtwaist industry. Dubbed the Uprising of the 20,000, it was the largest strike by women to date in American history. The young strikers’ courage, tenacity, and solidarity forced the predominantly male leadership in the “needle trades” and the American Federation of Labor to revise their entrenched prejudices against organizing women. The strikers won only a portion of their demands, but the uprising sparked five years of revolt that transformed the garment industry into one of the best-organized trades in the United States.
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yesterdaysprint · 1 year
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St. Louis Post-Dispatch, Missouri, March 7, 1897
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explore-blog · 28 days
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In the autumn of 1883, a paper in the nation's capital reported that "an Iowa woman has spent 7 years embroidering the solar system on a quilt" — to teach astronomy in an era when women could not attend college. Her story.
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queerasfact · 9 months
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40 years ago today Sally Ride became the first American woman in space and - to the best of our knowledge - the first queer woman in space - when she took part in the Challenger shuttle mission on 18 June 1983. Sally was chosen for the flight because of her expertise with the shuttle’s robotic arm which lifted satellites into orbit. She described her experience as “the most fun I’ll ever have in my life”.
Learn more
[Image: Sally on the 1983 mission, smiling, in her blue NASA suit in space, with various control panels visible behind her]
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she-is-ovarit · 10 months
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It's concerning that this is now an LGB and women's issue now, but I really encourage people to begin purchasing USB drives or external hard drives and saving digital research on things such as gay & lesbian history, screenshots of tweets that might be important, homosexual and bisexual research, women's history, radical feminist books or PDFs, and really just anything that is at risk of being "corrected" by gender ideology or made inaccessible by academic publishers.
We need to save these things in a hard copy format as opposed to just using internet archive or taking Sci-hub for granted, because these organizations are experiencing heavy lawsuits. Additionally, it's becoming common for LGB and gender nonconformity history and research to be "rewritten" by gender ideologists. Actually, this is even true for past research and history on transvestism and transsexualism, too, in addition to things such as sex dysphoria, etc.
I bought three 64GB USBs for just $25. If you can't afford an external hardrive, buy some different colored USBs and start building your own library. We need to preserve this information and decentralize it as much as possible. It's worrisome enough that we rely on digital archives this much just generally, especially with the advent of AI and government and corporate attempts to eliminate data privacy and control.
This is a women's rights issue and an LGB issue now.
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marzipanandminutiae · 3 months
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oh, The Female Economy: The Millinery and Dressmaking Trades 1860-1930 (Wendy Gamber, 1997), we're really in it now
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roversrovers · 8 months
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At the centre of Rosalind Franklin’s tombstone in London’s Willesden Jewish Cemetery is the word “scientist”. This is followed by the inscription, “Her research and discoveries on viruses remain of lasting benefit to mankind.” As one of the twentieth century’s pre-eminent scientists, Franklin’s work has benefited all of humanity. The one-hundredth anniversary of her birth this month is prompting much reflection on her career and research contributions, not least Franklin’s catalytic role in unravelling the structure of DNA.
. . .
But Franklin’s remarkable work on DNA amounts to a fraction of her record and legacy. She was a tireless investigator of nature’s secrets, and worked across biology, chemistry and physics, with a focus on research that mattered to society. She made important advances in the science of coal and carbon, and she became an expert in the study of viruses that cause plant and human diseases. In essence, it is because of Franklin, her collaborators and successors, that today’s researchers are able to use tools such as DNA sequencing and X-ray crystallography to investigate viruses such as SARS-CoV-2.
. . .
Franklin was an inveterate traveller on the global conference circuit and a collaborator with international partners. She won a rare grant (with Klug) from the US National Institutes of Health. She was a global connector in the booming early days of research into virus structures: an expert in pathogenic viruses who had gained an international reputation and cared deeply about putting her research to use. It is a travesty that Franklin is mostly remembered for not receiving full credit for her contributions to the discovery of DNA’s structure. That part of Franklin’s life story must never be forgotten, but she was so much more than the “wronged heroine”, and it’s time to recognize her for the full breadth and depth of her research career.
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usnatarchives · 2 months
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Beyond the Stars: Mae Jemison’s Odyssey ✨
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Happy Black History Month!
This Black History Month, we spotlight the extraordinary life of Dr. Mae Jemison, the first African American woman to travel in space. Born on October 17, 1956, in Decatur, Alabama, and raised in Chicago, Illinois, Jemison’s journey into the stars is a testament to the power of dreams and determination.
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From an early age, Jemison showed a keen interest in science and space, but noticed the absence of women astronauts. She pursued her passion relentlessly, earning a B.S. in Chemical Engineering from Stanford University and an M.D. from Cornell Medical College. Before joining NASA, Jemison was a general practitioner and served in the Peace Corps in Sierra Leone and Liberia, where she managed health care for other volunteers. In 1987, Jemison’s dream became reality when she was selected for NASA’s astronaut program. On September 12, 1992, aboard the Space Shuttle Endeavor on mission STS-47, Jemison became the first African American woman to travel in space, serving as a mission specialist. During her eight-day mission, she conducted experiments on weightlessness and motion sickness, contributing valuable data to the field.
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Jemison’s honors include induction into the National Women’s Hall of Fame, the National Medical Association Hall of Fame, and the Texas Science Hall of Fame, among others. Her story is not just one of breaking barriers in space exploration, but also of inspiring generations to pursue their dreams, regardless of birth and obstacles.
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For more information on Mae Jemison’s groundbreaking journey and contributions to science and humanity, the National Archives holds numerous resources that illuminate the lives and achievements of African American pioneers:
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todaysdocument · 1 year
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Some handy tips from the War Department’s “You’re Going to Employ Women” pamphlet, April 1, 1943. 
Unfortunately, this is not a joke. 
Record Group 407: Records of the Adjutant General's Office
Series: Central Decimal Correspondence Files
File Unit: 291.9 Status of Women 1-1-42 THRU 12-31-45
Transcription: 
(a pamphlet with single staple on left side, off-white paper)
You're Going to Employ Women
WAR DEPARTMENT
WASHINGTON, D. C.
(In pencil along right side)  WGCS  17, 291.9,  (4-1-43)
[page 2]
(left page black and white photo)  woman filing a piece of metal
_______________careful...
(right facing page)  
(title)  When Training Women
ORIENT her more thoroughly than a man on health and safety rules, plant layout and production, company policies, job techniques.
Give her a preliminary training course to get the feel of work.
Relate her job training to past experience, usually domestic--interpret machinery operation in terms of household and kitchen appliances.
Arrange for continuous upgrading and train her for higher grade jobs.
Use community training facilities when necessary--trade schools, vocational classes in colleges and universities.
[page 3]
(Left side same woman)
_____________and conscientious...
(Right side)
(title)  When Working Woman
LIMIT her hours to 8 a day and 48 a week.
Schedule short morning and afternoon rest intervals on arduous jobs.
Have diet-balanced luncheons available--and  extra food on exhausting jobs.
Provide ample clean toilets and rest rooms--good plant ventilation free of dust, fumes and drafts--work seats and benches at proper height--clean orderly surroundings--safety devices on machinery.
Insist on proper work clothing, safe shoes.
Promote adequate local housing and transportation.
And…
[page 4]
(Left side of page)
(title)
Use a Trained Personnel Woman
She can counsel with management on training, job simplification and all general employment policies.
She understands women-worker needs.
She can give sympathetic attention to home problems.
She can be told personal difficulties that would not be confided to a man.
She can arrange for child care.
(right facing page)
-Women are pliant--adaptable.
-Women are dexterous--finger nimble.
-Women are accurate--precision workers.
-Women are good at repetitive tasks.
-Women are fine color and material observants.
Women CAN BE TRAINED TO DO ALMOST ANY JOB YOU'VE GOT.
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animentality · 1 year
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Woman of the year. Happy international women's day to Rodrick.
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city-of-ladies · 11 days
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"Burginda’s letter is instructing the young man in his spiritual endeavours, and the contents of the (albeit short) letter reveal that she was highly educated and well-read. Written in a period that many still refer to erroneously as an intellectual ‘Dark Ages’, Burginda’s letter uses Greek words, utilises biblical exegesis, imitates Christian poetry like the fifth-century Psychomachia of Prudentius, and references both the sixth-century Italian poet Arator and the classical Roman poet Virgil. It also contains a reworking of a description of heaven found in a Latin poem from Africa that dates to c. 500. Burginda was clearly a very well-read intellectual.
This letter can be used as an example to refute many popular misconceptions about the early middle ages. The first misconception is that antique texts were neglected or unknown in this period. The second misconception is that medieval women were uneducated and unintellectual. The third misconception is that there was little or no intellectual transmission between Africa and Europe in this period. Burginda’s letter proves all these assumptions false. Not bad for two paragraphs of Latin."
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vifetoile · 1 year
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In fond allusion to this post:
All my female ancestors watching over me like "Look at her... she has time to study art and politics and history... she spends her time writing stories that mean something to her..."
"She can take a pill for pain whenever she wants! A mysterious thing called Advil that eases the Curse of Eve!"
"Forget Eve, our great-great granddaughter doesn't have to go to Mass three times a week! She can say what she thinks!"
"She only sews and bakes when she wants to, when she wants to make beautiful things!"
"Thirty-three and she's young and strong, not saddled with babies and family members to take care of... she's taking care of herself and helping out her parents too--- that's our girl! That's OUR GIRL!"
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