National Clearinghouse on
Marital and Date Rape
http://ncmdr.org
mirror site:
http://members.aol.com/ncmdr
WOMEN'S HISTORY MONTH ORIGINS
(see also Women's History Month 1998)
TO: A feminist listserv
FROM: Laura X
29 Oct 1996
SUBJECT: Advice for a high school student, and the (planned and promised, but still not happened by March 97) November 19 unveiling of a statue commemorating Susan B. Anthony, Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Lucretia Mott in the US Capitol Rotunda
Question from Laura X, founder (1968) / director, Women's History Library / (1978) National Clearinghouse on Marital and Date Rape:
What advice/listservs to give this delightful person, Lauren Beauchamp? She is our future!! Dig that signature! Blew me awaaay!
I confess, I did invent National Women's History Month -- built it around International Women's Day starting in 1969, which day had been publically ignored since 1947, so we took it to the streets of Berkeley with a grand parade for March 8th. The news went all over the country and people started sending me everything imaginable about women building the Womens History Library. Stuff went on in 30 cities the next March 8, and so it grew.
Notes like this one below from a high school student remind me of why I did it and why i'm still struggling for real respect for women and girl children (Beijing lingo.) Please help her and cc ABIGAILS-L and FAVNET to inspire us all to do more for her and others.
When she called, I sent her to one of my spiritual/political descendents, the National Women's History Project -- they are the ones since the late 70s who fulfilled my early wildest dreams and more -- they provide all the materials which she and everybody needs, from mugs to books to posters to videos, all multi-cultural in great richness, and it is they who got National Women's History Month thru Congress. The nearly a million documents which we collected and published on microfilm, HERSTORY, WOMEN AND LAW, and WOMEN's HEALTH/ MENTAL HEALTH are available from them now, too. The collections are the records of the womens movement nationally and internationally, 1968-74. They can be reached at 7738 Bell Road, Winsor, California 95492, (707-636-2888), email NWHP@aol.com.
Meanwhile does everyone know the statue of Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Susan B. Anthony and Lucretia Mott will rise from the crypt of the US Capitol to the Rotunda on November 19, thanks to the efforts of the National Museum of Women's History Foundation?
Call (703) 299-0552. Karen, the foundation's president, told me she is particularly pleased that the rigging company is owned by an African American woman. As you know, those three women in the statue were staunch abolitionists and Susan B. Anthony lead the petition drive to Congress gathering 400,000 signatures for the 13th Amendment to the US Constitution which abolished slavery and involuntary servitude.
It took 55 more years until the Amendment with Susan B. Anthony's name on it passed, granting women the right to vote. The other two women were "at it" even before her. And they were all close friends with Frederick Douglass, the greatest orator of his time, white or Black, and leading abolitionist of Black and women's slavery.
Lastly, let me vigorously recommend the audio cassette Frederick Douglass's greatest speeches, "Why I became a Women's Rights Man" with Broadway and film baritone Fred Morsell (TBM Records, 6712 West Road, New Canaan, Conn. 86840, (203) 966-5216.) I cannot begin to tell you what an inspiration those speeches are when you are down and out! I listened to them the night before my plenary speech at the National Coalition Against Domestic Violence Conference from which I did not recover until I went to visit Harriett Tubman's home in Auburn NY, a don't miss. Ditto Frederick Douglass's home in DC , Elizabeth Cady Stanton's home near the Women's Rights National Historic Park in Seneca Falls, NY, and Susan B. Anthony's home in Rochester, NY.
My name, which stands for women's history being anonymous, and protests our legal slavery as exemplified by laws which give husbands and dates the right to rape us, started as a pen name late in 1969, but really began when I was 12 and went to my cousin's wedding and saw her handed over without standing on her own two feet once! I had just seen pictures of children being sold at estate slave auctions on the courthouse steps of St. Louis where I grew up. I always was an impressionable soul!
So folks, tell Lauren and/or the rest of us how you were at 15 and how you got started "agitating", as Frederick Douglass advises his protege on the video they show at his home (which is also a national park.) Hands off our parks, Newt Gingrich, we'll vote you and your unkind kind out November 5!
TO: Laura X
FROM: Lauren Beauchamp
28 Oct 1996
SUBJECT: Womens History
Laura,
Hi there.
Well, you told me to email you and so I did however, I am not quite sure what I should write. I guess I could just repeat my letter that you received in snail mail.
I am interested in starting a women's history month at my school (Gainesville High School) and I am not quite sure how to go about it. I have never done this before and neither has my activities director, so if there is any information you could send me I would be ever so grateful. I have received your packet on marital and date rape which was quite helpful to a certain point, but I need information on Women's History Month, so if you can help me out at all I would appreciate it very much.
If at all possible, forward this letter to anyone you feel could help me attain my goal. Thanks for all your support and help.
Love,
Lauren Elaine Beauchamp
TO: Laura X
FROM: Lauren Beauchamp
28 Oct 1996
SUBJECT: You are amazing
Laura,
I am in awe of what you have done for women. I always thought that speakers were people who had been the victim themselves and so I never thought that I would be able to do anything really, without feeling out of place. Of course there is always the possability that something could happen to me, however, so far I have been lucky. I just want you to know that if there is anything I can do to help just let me know. I am only 15 and I do live in Florida, but in these days maybe there is something I could do. I would love to help out in any way possible. :) I hope that someday I will be able to contribute more than I am able to at this time.
Thanks ever so much for making me realise that I could do something to help women just as you have. You are truly an inspiration. :)
Love,
Lauren Elaine Beauchamp
"You don't try to rape a GODDESS!" - Babes in Toyland