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May 23

05-23 TABLE of CONTENTS: Jill E. Barad, Mattel CEO DATES, ANNIVERSARIES, and EVENTS QUOTE by Charlette Perkins Gilman. Jill E. Barad, Mattel CEO Born 05-23-1951, Jill E. Barad became president of chief operating officer of Mattel, Inc., in 1992.       She joined Mattel in 1981 as a product manager and became marketing director of the Barbie line in 1982. Under her guidance Barbie sales moved from $485 million in 1988 to more than $1 BILLION in 1994.       Her marketing strategy included Hot Wheels as well as tie-ins with Disney, McDonald's, etc. She's made Mattel the largest toy manufacturing company in the world.       JEB bore two children while making her way to the top, not letting pregnancy slow her down. In fact, one of her major promotions came when she was five months pregnant. Today, there are more Barbie dolls in existence than there are people in the U.S. | PRIOR DATE |        | HOME |       | WOA INDEX |       | NEXT DATE |   | RETURN TO TOP OF PAGE | 05-23 DATES, ANNIVERSARIES, and EVENTS B. 05-23-1810, Margaret Fuller, one America's first journalists who caused a commotion that necessitated calling the police when she entered the New York City library and sat down to read a book.       MF became the first editor of a large American newspaper who was also a woman, serving as assistant editor of the New York Tribune. Her Woman in the Nineteenth Century (1845) was both a demand for political equality and an ardent plea for the emotional, intellectual, and spiritual fulfillment of women. She taught school, wrote poetry, reviews, and critiques for a literary magazine The Dial that she later edited from 1840 to 1842. She was a dazzling speaker who conducted classes of "conversations" for women on literature, education, mythology, and philosophy in Boston from 1839-1844. Reason for the lectures? She needed money to food. Contrary to conventional histories, ALL women did not live in comfort on their menfolk's earnings. Event: 05-23-1827: Joanna Bethune and Hannah L. Murray, created the first nursery school in New York, "to relieve parents of the laboring classes from the care of their children while engaged in the vocations by which they lived, and provide for the children, a protection from the weather, from idleness and the contamination of evil example besides affording them the means of early and efficient education."       Almost 500 children were cared for in the first two years. All the children had mothers who had to work in order to be able to feed their children. B. 05-23-1846, Arabella Mansfield, U.S.educator of whom an Iowa bar examiner said, " (gives) the very best rebuke possible to the imputation that ladies cannot qualify for the practice of law," and in 1869 certified her as in Iowa as the first attorney-woman combination in U.S. history. She was a dean at DePauw University. B. 05-23-1875, Kate Bernard, was elected Oklahoma commissioner of charities and corrections in 1907 and was reelected in 1910 was the first U.S. woman to be elected to a statewide position. B. 05-23-1910, Margaret Wise Brown, U.S. children's book author and illustrator editor, producing more than 100 books which she published under various names. Many of her books are considered classics of the genre. B. 05-23-1914, Barbara Mary Ward, British economist who was one of the most widely read and influential writers on economics and international affairs in the English-speaking world. She became one of the first women to become a member of the Roman Catholic Curia (1967). In 1967, she cooperated in drafting a resolution to end the church's ban on birth control, but later in a well publicized paper she recanted her position. B. 05-23-1920, Helen O'Connell and born 05-23-1928 Rosemary Clooney - both highly popular American pop singers. B. 05-23-1923, Alicia De Larrocha, Spanish musician, one of the great concert pianists of all time who was in constant demand by major orchestras throughout the world when she was well into her 70s. Event 05-23-1991: in Rust v Sullivan, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled government could prevent doctors and nurses from giving medical advice to women by restricting Title X funded clinic personnel mentioning abortion even if the pregnancy threatened a woman's life or health. | PRIOR DATE |        | HOME |       | WOA INDEX |       | NEXT DATE |   | RETURN TO TOP OF PAGE | QUOTES DU JOUR PERKINS, CHARLETTE GILMAN:       "Young boys plan for what they will achieve and attain, young girls plan for whom they will achieve and attain."             -- Charlette Perkins Gilman (1860-1935) in Women and Economics. | PRIOR DATE |        | HOME |       | WOA INDEX |       | NEXT DATE |   | RETURN TO TOP OF PAGE |