11-27-1994 Women of Achievement and Herstory

    A couple of men have written in objection to my reference to the

radical religious right supremacists attempting to set up a theocracy in

the United States. They claim it might be a good thing ...something new

to straighten things out by putting THEIR version of god first.

    May I _humbly_ point out that we had theocracies in what is now

the United States.  The religious refugees who settled in the New World

fleeing religious intolerance in their home areas set up religiously

intolerant theocracies here.  Any correct reading of the Colonies'

HIStories will prove that.

    The results were such sterling episodes in our history as the

hanging of Quakers, burning books, giving formal thanks when Ann

Hutchinson and her children were murdered, and, of course, the Salem

witchcraft trials in which 19 women, one man, and two dogs were

executed.

    When the U.S Constitution was formulated such memories were

very, very vivid in everyone's mind, and thus the first amendment -

the freedom for you to worship as you choose and the freedom for us

to NOT worship if we choose - became a basic right of our nation.

    Yes, independent freedom for men was limited under the

theocracies, but any reading of HIStory teaches us that women were

even more abused and without the right to vote or speak in public,

without civil rights, and had no, none at all, rights to food, their own

clothing, or even life because of unrestricted pregnancies in the

theocracies...and their husbands/fathers/brothers could imprison and

restrict their movements in any and all ways without having to answer

to anyone.

    It's not a way of life most women would consider looking forward

to...again.  

Anniversaries -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

    B. 11-27-1809, Fanny Kemble, born into an acting family, she was

an acclaimed star in both England and the United States.  She had

disdained acting but was forced into it to save her family from financial

ruin. For a time she retired from the stage, marrying a Philadelphia

man who was also a Georgia plantation owner.  Her shock at the

plantation conditions and later her husband's adultery led to divorce. 

Although she wrote several books, her Journal of a Residence on a

Georgian Plantation (1863) is her most telling work and her writings

give historians insight into stage and social conditions of the 19th

century.  She was an early suffrager. 

    B. 11-27-1867, Margaret Ruthven Lang, composer. Her most noted

works: Witichis and  Sappho's Prayer to Aphrodite.

    B. 11-27-1875, Elsie Worthington Clews Parsons, holder of a Ph.D.

who had to publish under the pseudonym John Main so as not to

embarrass her husband with her feminists views.  After divorce, she

became a noted anthropologist and expert of the Pueblo Indians.

Foremost of her many books and articles is the two-volume Pueblo

Indian Religion (1939)

    B. 11-27-1909, Kunying Pierra Vejjabul, brave Thai physician who

campaigned against prostitution and polygamy in spite of death threats

and attempts on her life. Worked for the Thai public health department

and established Pierra Maternity and Child Welfare Foundation.

 (C) 1994 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.