Diana Mara Henry Proposal for a resurvey of the participants of the FNWC, 2007.

Women on the Move Fourth Decade Follow-Up Survey and Oral History of the Legacy of the First National Women’s Conference

Concept and Photographs by Diana Mara Henry 

In the thirty plus years since the First National Women’s Conference brought women to Houston in November 1977, what have these activists continued to do for themselves and others? How do they articulate the aspirations they brought as delegates to the conference, honored speakers, staff or Commissioners of the President’s Commission on International Women’s Year? What were their goals then and have they been able to realize these goals? What did the conference bring to their lives in terms of connections made and lessons learned? Have these women stayed active in the public arena? Have their positions on the issues changed? Where are they now?

 The last question is the key to the success of this study:  but the search for these ”20,000 women, men and children” who were there  (according to the official report, The Spirit of Houston) will in itself create interest, discussion, and reawakening of the commitments and ideals of  what may be considered the crowning event of Second Wave Feminism.

Many of the delegates went on to do great things: Ann Richards had just won her first election, to become the first female commissioner of Travis County; 13 years later, she would be elected Governor of Texas.  Claire Shulman became the First Borough President of Queens.  Mariko Tse pursued a career in film. Three Presidents’ wives were there; Betty Ford went on to become a distinguished advocate for others suffering from alcohol and substance abut and to found treatment centers to minister to their needs.     

What of the other hundred of delegates, some as young as 17, such as Colleen Wong, of California?  The nuns, the farm women, the welfare rights mothers, the sexual preference advocates? What did they go on to do with their lives? Did the conference serve as an inspiration and in what way? Have they stayed in touch and worked with others who were there?

After more than 30 years, while some of the leaders sadly are gone (Bella Abzug, Barbara Jordan, Patsy Mink) the women of the rank and file have now assumed their role in history, and their contributions to family, community and country can be ascertained. All we need to do is find them- and that, with the help of the Internet, can also be done. State by state, the delegate lists can be researched and contacts established.

Diana Henry has been in touch with some, such as one of the Last mile’s torch bearers, Peggy Kokernot (now Kaplan) who ran marathons as a US Marine and has become an animal rights activist; Chief Pulu Peneueta, of American Samoa, whose family has established a website honoring her memory, the conference coordinator, Lee (now Rabbi Leah) Novick, and Liz Carpenter, who continues to cheer on and support her with wit and wisdom.

We can put the contact sheets of more than 1,200 images made of them by the Conference’s official photographer online, and ask them to identify themselves therein.

We can ask them how they came to be at the Conference, and to tell us what they experienced and accomplished there. We can ask them to send us a photograph representing their role and/or interests and participation in family or community since 1977. We can ask them to describe what they have done since, whether their values have changed or become more focused, and what role their participation in the conference played in their life’s story.  What will emerge will be as diverse and inspiring as the conference in its day, and hopefully keep us on the mission Maya Angelou penned – “To Form a More Perfect Union.”  

What can result of this search? A book, a funded website, an exhibit, another National Women’s Conference? With the national scope of this project anything is possible, and with your help and interest, it will be done.

Diana Henry                                                                            February 9, 2007                                        

188 Sumner Avenue

Springfield, MA 01108

Schlesinger Library Grant application, 2008

( grant awarded to research the papers of women and organizations whose papers, photographs and documents are in the collection of the Schlesinger Library of the History of Women in America, among them: Betty Friedan, Clara Mortensen Beyer, Elizabeth Holtzman, Kathryn Clarenbach, National Women’s Political Caucus (Liz Carpenter) NOW (Eleanor Smeal, Karen De Crow), Mary Dent Crisp, Bettye Lane, Esther Peterson, Barbara Mikulski, Patsy Mink, Pat Schroeder, Barbara Jordan, Sissy Farenthold, Bella Abzug, Mary Ann Krupsak, and Yvonne Braithwaite Burke. All of these provided leadership, spoke, photographed at the FNWC and whose photographs of them are also in the Schlesinger Library’s collection. )

“Women on the Move”: Experience and perception of the

First National Women’s Conference. Prologue to a resurvey of its participants.

The First National Women’s Conference, held in Houston, TX, 11/18-21, 1977,  was “the first time the Congress and the President had authorized, sponsored, and financed a national gathering of women to talk about and act upon issues of concern to women. It was the first time women had come together as elected representatives from every state and territory in the nation to voice their needs and hopes for the future....Present were 1,403 delegates, 370 delegates-at-large, and 186 alternates, plus thousands of invited guests, observers, and member of the general public....” ( From the introduction to The Spirit of Houston...an Official Report to the President, the Congress and the People of the United States.)

In the thirty plus years since, what have these activists continued to do for themselves and others? How do they articulate the aspirations they brought as delegates to the conference, honored speakers, staff or Commissioners of the President’s Commission on International Women’s Year? What were their goals then and have they been able to realize these goals? What did the conference bring to their lives in terms of connections made and lessons learned? Have these women stayed active in the public arena? Have their positions on the issues changed? Where are they now?

I propose a resurvey of the participants, be they delegates, speakers, invited guests, photographers, beginning with those distinguished women and organizations whose papers, photographs and documents are in the collection of the Schlesinger Library of the History of Women in America, among them: Betty Friedan, Clara Mortensen Beyer, Elizabeth Holtzman, Kathryn Clarenbach, National Women’s Political Caucus (Liz Carpenter) NOW (Eleanor Smeal, Karen De Crow), Mary Dent Crisp, Bettye Lane, Esther Peterson, Barbara Mikulski, Patsy Mink, Pat Schroeder, Barbara Jordan, Sissy Farenthold, Bella Abzug, Mary Ann Krupsak, and Yvonne Braithwaite Burke. All of these provided leadership, spoke, photographed at the FNWC and my photographs of them are also in the Schlesinger Library’s collection.

Although some of these women are deceased, I will search their papers and in some cases, contact the families or organizations for additional materials and writings on the FNWC (as in the case of Clara Beyer, whose collection ends in 1974). Their writings will be researched for answers to questions that comprise my survey for surviving participants, composed as follows:

1. Name, address, phone, email and URL

2. What was your name and address at the time of the FNWC?

3. What was your occupation, age and schooling at that time?

4. Were you a delegate or in what other way were you involved in the conference?

5. Did you attend a State Meeting prior to attending the conference, and if so, which one?

6. Do you have ephemera (fliers, buttons, schedules, articles) from the meeting or the conference? If you have donated them or otherwise disposed of them, please tell us how.

7. Did you write about the meeting and/or conference and or photograph/film it and do you still have those writings/photographs/films? Do you have any intentions of placing those materials in an archive and if so, which one?

8. Please share with us why you attended the FNWC and state meeting.

9. Please share what you experienced there.

10. Please share your use of what you learned/did at the conference in future years and how the FNWC impacted your choices:

•What was your subsequent schooling/reading/research?

•What has been your career path or paths?

•What was your family configuration in 1977 and how did that change until now? •What was your work situation in 1977 and how did that change until now?

•What were your civic/philanthropic/volunteer paths then and how did they change?

• Has your political, religious, gender affiliation changed since 1977 and how?

11. Could you share a photograph with us of who you are today, either with family, in work setting, leisure occupation or any other representation of yourself?

1. Would you like to see another Women’s Conference on the scale of Houston, 1977 and do you think State Meetings would be a necessary component? Who should sponsor/fund such a conference?

2. What part(s) of the Plan of Action concerned you most in 1977 and what issues would be most important for you to see voted on today?

3. Are there any other changes in your life path that were or were not attributable to your experience at Houston that you would like to share?

4. Could you share a perspective on the women’s movement then, now and a recommendation on women’s issues for young women today? 

My research background started with my first job after Radcliffe, in 1969, for NBC News. My photography of one-room schools and schoolteachers of Vermont, undertaken for Earthwatch and shown at the Brattleboro Museum, led to a successful grant proposal to photograph One-Room Schools of Ulster County, NY. That Individual Artist’s Grant from the NY State Council on the Arts supported research and documentation of over 200 schoolhouses and exhibition in photographs and text from oral history interviews I conducted and historical materials collected, at three arts centers in the first year, with continuing exhibitions to now. A visit and photo essay in 1985 of the Natzweiler-Struthof concentration camp has led to 25 years of research, writing and publication culminating in my expertise on this camp that has been called preeminent in the world (see www.natzweiler-struthof.org).  

The collections of papers to be consulted at the Schlesinger Library are crucial to an investigation of a question so cogently articulated by Kathryn Kish Sklar,  Distinguished Professor of History, SUNY Binghampton, in her article and  that now, 30 years after the FNWC, scholarship and conferences (such as the Bella Abzug Leadership Institute’s “Freedom on Our Terms’” Hunter College, November 2007, where Diana Mara Henry's images opened the plenary session) are beginning to address as well: "How did the First National Women's Conference in Houston in 1977 shape a feminist agenda for the future?"  (http://womhist.alexanderstreet.com/dp59/intro.htm)

A resurvey of its participants could not begin in a better place or with more distinguished participants than those whose papers are in the Schlesinger Library collection. Clara Mortensen Beyer was the oldest delegate; Abzug the Presiding Officer; Holtzman and Carpenter (with whom I am still in touch) were Commissioners, along with Smeal and Krupsak ; Friedan a delegate-at large; Clarenbach, the Executive Director; Crisp, a delegate; Lane, another photographer whose work is at the Schlesinger; Farenthold and Krupsak chaired plenary sessions;  Burke chaired a hearing; Jordan gave the keynote address; Mink delivered a speech to the third plenary, Petersen gave a “Briefing from the Top.” Paired with my photographs of these women, also in the Schlesinger’s collection, these women’s writings and documents will provide exciting and convincing material for a book and documentary film about what may be considered the crowning event of Second Wave Feminism. If time allows, I will also research my folders of Conference ephemera, to add to the documentation of these women’s roles.

This is not something I could undertake without the grant assistance requested.

Thank you very much for your consideration.  

Diana Mara Henry     188 Sumner Avenue, Springfield, MA 01108     413-736-6414

April 2, 2008                                                                           dmh@dianamarahenry.com