March is Women’s History Month, when we try to focus on the contributions of women throughout history.
Last month, during Black History Month, we included many women among the African American luminaries we highlighted. See our February issues for information on those African American women who made (or should have made) history.
Women’s History Month began as Women’s History Week in Santa Rosa, CA in 1978. In 1980, President Jimmy Carter Designated March 2–8 as National Women’s History Week. In 1987 Congress passed a law extending it to a month.
Learn more at https://womenshistorymonth.gov and https://www.womenshistory.org/
Oral Histories with Westport Women
To mark Women’s History Month, we highlight some wonderful interviews with women of Westport!
If you know of someone that we should interview, please contact Westport Historical Society, westport history@westporthistory.net. Visit www.wpthistory.org
Elsie Roylance Buess
Interviewed at the age of 98, she reflects on her life and the changes she has witnessed, her memories of school, Remington’s Clambake, the 1938 hurricane, catching the trolley to New Bedford, and dances at the Grange and Lincoln Park. Visit https://vimeo.com/683842896
Florence Lees and Jean Hart
Florence Lees and Jean Hart with Russ Hart and Al Lees, interviewed by Betty Slade, reflect in growing up in Westport MA in the 1940s along Sanford Road.
Visit https://vimeo.com/683999008
Agnes Russell and Muriel Petty
Agnes Russell and Muriel Petty interviewed by Norma Sears and Betty Slade Sept 27 2004
Visit https://vimeo.com/311317931
Early Years in Westport
Early Years in Westport, Massachusetts with Betsy Acheson, Charlotte Fitch, Kathy Preston, Sally Yeomans, July 2005. Interviewed by Betty Slade.
Visit https://vimeo.com/311765233
Eleanor Donati
Eleanor Donati interviewed by Russ Hart and Betty Slade, November 2009
Visit https://vimeo.com/312183729
Ann Chandanais and Gloria Chester
Ann Chandanais and Gloria Chester, Westport Matters. No.98, 3-1-1998. Life long residents talk about their lives and remarkable events that affected local and national societies.
Visit https://vimeo.com/168539751
Grace DeAndrade
Grace DeAndrade Town Nurse Westport Matters No.107. 9-18-1998. Long retired former Town Nurse describes her duties and responsibilities during a career that started in mid 20th century.
Visit https://vimeo.com/164270111
Audrey Tripp, Jeanne Parsons
Teachers Audrey Tripp, Jeanne Parsons, Westport Matters No.30. 8-23-96. Two lifelong revered, dedicated Westport teachers recollect their lives and tenures. Westport Matters No. 30. 8-23-96.
Visit https://vimeo.com/159430729
Mary Fields, America’s First Black “Cowgirl”
Described as one of the toughest, most resilient residents of Cascade, Montana, Mary Fields traveled around the US after emancipation. She worked on steamboats and at a convent in Ohio. Fiercely independent, she refused to be bound by the stereotypes of her time, and eventually secured a contract as a Star Route Carrier, an independent contractor for the US Post Office. She was the first African American woman and the second woman to receive a Star Route. Visit https://www.nps.gov/people/mary-fields.htm
Eslanda Goode Robeson
Paul Robeson may have outshined his wife in the public eye, but he shouldn’t have. She was his manager, and also an anthropoligist and journalist.
Learn more at https://www.paulrobesonhouse.org/shining-a-light-on-eslanda-goode-robeson/
Aretha Franklin, Queen of Soul
Singer, songwriter, pianist, she has been on Rolling Stone’s 100 Greatest Artists of All time. Visit https://www.arethafranklin.net
Lynn Nottage, Playwright
“Lynn Nottage is a playwright and a screenwriter. She is the first, and remains the only, woman to have won the Pulitzer Prize for Drama twice. Her plays have been produced widely in the United States and throughout the world,” from http://www.lynnnottage.com/about.html
Charity Bailey, The Lady Pied Piper
In 1928, Charity Baily, a gifted musician and graduate of Rhode Island College of Education, could not get a job because she was black. She moved to New York City, but did not teach. She did host a television show from 1954 to 1956, “Sing a Song,” that was an interracial children’s show.
Visit https://rhodetour.org/items/show/422?tour=48&index=3
Willa Beatrice Brown, A Woman with Wings
Willa Brown was the first African American woman to get a pilot’s license in the US and the first to run for the US Congress, and the first woman to have both a pilot’s license and an aircraft mechanic’s license.
She also co-founded the first private flight training academy owned and operated by African Americans in the US. Several of her trainees became Tuskagee Airmen.
Visit
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Willa_Brown,
https://pioneersofflight.si.edu/content/willa-brown-0
https://www.nationalww2museum.org/war/articles/lieutenant-willa-brown
Harriet Tubman
Harriet Tubman was an escaped slave who led slaves to freedom on the Underground Railroad. In her later years, after the Civil War, she became active in the women’s suffrage movement and worked with Susan B. Anthony. Tubman opened a rest home for indigent people and moved there in her old age. Visit https://www.history.com/topics/black-history/harriet-tubman
Susan B. Anthony
A champion of temperance, abolition, the rights of labor and equal pay for equal work, she became one of the visible leaders of the women’s suffrage movement (from website below). She spend her life working for women’s right to vote. She died 14 years before the 19th Amendment passed in 1920.
Visit https://www.womenshistory.org/education-resources/biographies/susan-b-anthony
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