Heroes & Trailblazers

Be inspired by fascinating men and women whose drive and determination transformed our country and our lives.

The Future of Women: Michelle Obama and Marissa Mayer

I want to close Women’s History Month with thoughts of the future. An email from a reader last week said it perfectly: “Based on what these women have accomplished, I see great blankpotential for women of today and the future.”

I agree. Tuesday night two of my daughters and I attended a program at New York’s 92nd Street Y featuring Marissa Mayer, the young woman who is Employee #20 at Google and is now vice president of location and local services. Suddenly I felt very hopeful. After years of worrying that America wasn’t really making as much progress as we had hoped when the women’s movement built speed in the 1970s and ‘80s, I began to re-think my concern.

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Jane Swisshelm, Journalist, Abolitionist, Women’s Rights Advocate

  • Ardent abolitionist and advocate for women’s rightsblank
  • First woman to cover a story from the Senate press gallery

Jane Cannon Swisshelm was born in Pittsburgh in 1815. Her father was a Presbyterian minister who died when Jane was only eight. Without him to provide for them, the family faced financial hardship so Jane had to quit school and work with her mother at lacemaking. When she was fourteen she was able to get a job as a teacher. (At a later date, I will investigate the changes in teaching requirements in American schools.)

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Jennie Grossinger (1892-1972), Garment Worker to Resort Owner

  • Established a world-class, financially successful resort

Jennie Grossinger was born in Austria in 1892 to parents who wanted to save enough blankmoney to bring the family to America for a better life.  When Jennie was five, her father emigrated, and three years later he had saved enough money to bring Jennie, her younger sister, and her mother to New York; they lived on the lower east side.  Her father, a former real estate overseer, was now a coat presser; life was not easy.

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Jean Carroll (1911-2010), Pioneered the Path for Female Stand-Up Comediennes

  • blankOne of the early female comics (Moms Mabley preceded her, performing in the 1910s, but she was on the black vaudeville circuit; more about her another day)
  • Appeared on The Ed Sullivan Show more than twenty times

Born Celine Zeigman in Paris, France, she moved with her family to New York City when she was still a child. Her father was abusive to her mother. Growing up in that atmosphere led Celine to the conclusion that she needed to be self-supporting, to never have to be dependent upon a man.

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