May 19, 1995 - Episode 294 - Women of Achievement and Herstory

      Sara G. Bagley (no birthdate or year) - When the factory
owners in Lowell, Massachusets, cut wages and insisted on increased
productivity, Bagley helped found and became first president of the
Lowell Female Labor Reform Association. She edited its _Voice of
Industry magazine_ (1845).  She organized female mill workers, but
their pleas to the Massachusetts legislature for better working
conditions and a ten-hour work day instead of 12 failed.
      When the mill factories were first started in New England, the
owners had a paternal attitude and conditions for the women were
fairly benign. Many farm girls worked in the mills for a couple of
years to earn extra money for their marriages and lived in the
closely supervised company barracks for a nominal cost. With the
rush of immigrants, at that period mainly poor Irish, the second
generation mill owners decreased wages, increased hours, raised room
and board rates until the conditions for the women became almost
intolerable.
  The women worked for the poor wages under the despicable
conditions because that's all they could do if they did not marry 
and had no families to support them.  Other than prostitution or
worse conditions as servants, there was no other way for them to
earn their food.

05-19 Anniversaries ...............................................

      B. 05-19-1800, Sarah Miriam Peale, portrait painter

      B. 05-19-1820, Margaret Junkin Preston, whose poetry was
primarily about the South and the Civil War.

      B. 05-19-1861, Dame Nellie Melba,  Australian born coloratura
soprano. So great was her popularity that Melba toast and peach
Melba were named for her.

      B. 05-19-1879, Nancy Witcher Astor, Viscountess, Lady Astor,
American-born English feminist, first woman elected to the British
House of Commons (1919). She kept her seat for more than 25 years.

      Event 05-19-1906, for the first time in its history, the British
Prime Minister received a delegation on behalf of women's suffrage. 
The first speaker was Emily Davis.  She had been one of the two
women who handed John Stuart Mills the first petition for women's
suffrage ever presented to the British Parliament in 1866. The Prime
Minister said he personally favored suffrage for women, but his
cabinet did not and therefore he could do nothing.  The campaign for
women's vote in England culminated 12 years later when women 30
and over were granted suffrage.

      B. 05-19-1930, Lorraine Hansberry, first black woman to have a
play produced on Broadway, _A Raisin In The Sun_.  She died when 
only 34.

      B. 05-19-1941, Nora Ephron, author. Wrote _Heartburn_ and the
screenplays of _Silkwood_ and  _My Blue Heaven_.

      B. 05-19-1941, Jane Ellen Brody, journalist, author, primarily of
science and medical subjects.  Authored _Jane Brody's Nutrition
Book_ (1981)0000 and _Jane Brody's Good Food Book_ (1985). Her
mother was a school teacher. 

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

      "In passing, I would like to say that the first time Adam had a
chance, he laid the blame on a woman."
            -- Lady Nancy Astor, 1923.


>>>(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. <<<