March is Women’s History Month, and this March, Entering Pawtucket is celebrating Phenomenal women everywhere. Today we’re spotlighting Mary Elizabeth “Lizzie” Murphy, Anna Cano-Morales, and Dorothy R. Crockett.
March is Women’s History Month, and this March, Entering Pawtucket is celebrating Phenomenal women everywhere. Today we highlight these Phenomenal RI Women...
Photo: Curriculum Nacional
Sacagawea (also spelled Sakakawea or Sacajawea; May c. 1788 – December 20, 1812, or April 9, 1884).
Sacagawea was a Shoshone woman who accompanied the Lewis and Clark expedition in 1804-06. Also called the Corps of Discovery, the expedition traveled from the northern plains through the Rocky Mountains to the Pacific Ocean and back. Her skills as a translator were invaluable, as was her intimate knowledge of some difficult terrain. Perhaps most significant was her calming presence on both the expedition team and the Native Americans they encountered, who might have otherwise been hostile to the strangers. Remarkably, Sacagawea did it all while caring for the son she bore just two months before departing.
Possibly the most memorialized woman in the United States, with dozens of statues and monuments, Sacagawea lived a short but legendarily eventful life in the American West. A member of the Lemhi band of the Native American Shoshone tribe, Sacagawea grew up surrounded by the Rocky Mountains in the Salmon River region of what is now Idaho.
In 1804, the Corps of Discovery reached a Mandan village, where Captains Meriwether Lewis and William Clark built Fort Mandan for wintering over in 1804–05. They interviewed several trappers who might be able to interpret or guide the expedition up the Missouri River in the springtime. Knowing they would need to communicate with the tribal nations who lived at the headwaters of the Missouri River, they agreed to hire Toussaint Charbonneau, who claimed to speak several Native languages, and one of his wives, who spoke Shoshone. Sacajawea was pregnant with her first child at the time. Charbonneau and Sacagawea moved into the expedition's fort a week later. Clark later nicknamed her "Janey." Lewis recorded the birth of Jean Baptiste Charbonneau on February 11, 1805, noting that another of the party's interpreters administered crushed rattlesnake rattles in water to speed the delivery. Clark and other members of the Corps nicknamed the boy "Pomp" or "Pompy."
While Sacagawea has been depicted as a guide for the expedition, she is recorded as providing direction in only a few instances, primarily in present-day Montana. Her work as an interpreter helped the party to negotiate with the Shoshone. But, she also had significant value to the mission simply by her presence on the journey, as having a woman and infant accompany them demonstrated the peaceful intent of the expedition. While traveling through what is now Franklin County, Washington, in October 1805, Clark noted that "the wife of Shabono [Charbonneau] our interpreter, we find reconciles all the Indians, as to our friendly intentions a woman with a party of men is a token of peace." Further he wrote that she "confirmed those people of our friendly intentions, as no woman ever accompanies a war party of Indians in this quarter".
“You have been a long time with me and conducted your Self in Such a manner as to gain my friendship, your woman who accompanied you that long dangerous and fatiguing rout to the Pacific Ocean and back deserved a greater reward for her attention and services on that rout than we had in our power to give her at the Mandans. As to your little Son (my boy Pomp) you well know my fondness of him and my anxiety to take him and raise him as my own child.… If you are disposed to accept either of my offers to you and will bring down you Son your famn [femme, woman] Janey had best come along with you to take care of the boy until I get him.… Wishing you and your family great success & with anxious expectations of seeing my little danceing boy Baptiest I shall remain your Friend, William Clark”. [sic]
— Clark to Charbonneau, August 20, 1806
Sources: History.com and Wikipedia
Click below to learn more about the phenomenal life of Sacagawea
Photo: Smithsonian Institution
Matilda Sissieretta Joyner Jones (January 5, 1868 or 1869 – June 24, 1933) Sissieretta Jones was an American soprano. She was often called "The Black Patti" in reference to Italian opera singer Adelina Patti. Jones' repertoire included grand opera, light opera, and popular music. Matilda Sissieretta Joyner Jones broke barriers for African Americans in entertainment, performing at the White House for President Benjamin Harrison and for members of the British royal family. She was also the first African American to sing at Carnegie Hall. She embodied the success African Americans could achieve after emancipation, as her father had been a slave
After training at the Providence Academy and New England Conservatory of Music, Jones went on to create the Black Patti Troubadours, in part because of the racism she encountered when trying to secure venues in the United States. She starred in the traveling show for over 20 years, which also helped showcase the talents of other Black performers to predominantly white audiences. She traveled the world, performing in South America, Australia and Europe. Her performances were known for combining classic opera with popular music of the day.
A soprano opera singer, she was the highest-paid African American of her time, founding The Black Troubadours.
Sources: USA Today. Women of the Century, Wikipedia
Photo: Maine Memory Network
Dorothea Lynde Dix (April 4, 1802 – July 17, 1887). Dorothea Dix was born in the town of Hampden, Maine, she grew up in Worcester, Massachusetts, among her parents' relatives. She was the first child of three born to Joseph Dix and Mary Bigelow, who had deep ancestral roots in Massachusetts Bay Colony. Dorothea Lynde (married to Dr. Elijah Dix) in Boston to get away from her alcoholic parents and abusive father. She began to teach in a school all for girls in Worcester, Massachusetts at fourteen years old and had developed her own curriculum for her class, in which she emphasized ethical living and the natural sciences. In about 1821 Dix opened a school in Boston, which was patronized by well-to-do families. Soon afterward she also began teaching poor and neglected children out of the barn of her grandmother's house, but she suffered poor health. It has been suggested that Dorothea suffered from major depressive episodes, which contributed to her poor health.
Dix is Internationally known for her activism on behalf of asylum and prison reform, and later leader of Union nurses during the Civil War. She traveled tens of thousands of miles, almost always alone, inspecting prisons, jails, poorhouses and almshouses. The conditions she conveyed in her numerous exposés were horrendous. Local officials purportedly shook with fear when she showed up on their doorsteps demanding admittance. Due to her efforts, every state in the ever-expanding United States allocated land, money and legislative attention to the creation and improvement of insane asylums. Yet despite working with prominent male abolitionists, she remained explicitly racist and resisted abolitionism. The denial of the rights of the institutionalized, the overwhelming ability of husbands to institutionalize their wives as insane, the inequalities of racially segregated asylums, and the published exposés of ex-asylum inmates who sought to bring attention to asylum abuses simply did not exist and/or did not matter in Dix’s world. Like all of us, she’s a bundle of contradictions — but unlike most of us, her contradictions had impact.
Source: TIME.com and Wikipedia
Photo: Imdb
Wilma Glodean Rudolph (June 23, 1940 – November 12, 1994) was an American sprinter who overcame childhood polio and went on to become a world-record-holding Olympic champion and international sports icon in track and field following her successes in the 1956 and 1960 Olympic Games.
Despite being told as a child she would never walk again, Wilma Rudolph relentlessly pursued her dreams becoming an international track and field star. At the height of her career, “the fastest woman in the world” used her platform to shed light on social issues.
Wilma Glodean Rudolph was born on June 23, 1940 in Saint Bethlehem, Tennessee. As one of 22 children, she was constantly surrounded by support and care, which she needed given her poor health. Rudolph survived bouts of polio and scarlet fever. Her illness forced her to wear a brace on her leg. Rudolph’s diagnosis was very bleak, “my doctor told me I would never walk again. My mother told me I would. I believed my mother.” Together, Rudolph’s parents and siblings took turns taking care of her. They would often remove her leg brace and massage her injured leg. At the age of six, Rudolph began to hop on one leg. By eight she could move around with a leg brace. At the age of 11, Rudolph’s mother discovered her playing basketball outside. She quickly turned to sports, becoming a natural athlete. She was nominated as All-American in basketball during high school. However, after a chance meeting with a college coach she turned to track and field.
While still in high school Rudolph competed on the collegiate level. She competed in the 1956 Olympic games and won a bronze medal in 4x100 relay. Four years later, Rudolph headed to the 1960 summer Olympics determined to get gold. Her performance in Rome cemented her as one of the greatest athletes of the 20th century. She won three gold medals and broke at least three world records. Rudolph became the first American woman to win three gold medals in track and field at the same Olympic game. Her performance also earned her the title of “the fastest woman in the world.”
Returning home an Olympic champion Rudolph refused to attend her homecoming parade if it was not integrated. She won the Associated Press Female Athlete of the Year award in 1961. The following year, Rudolph retired from track and field. She went on to finish her degree at Tennessee State University and began working in education. She continued her involvement in sports, working at several community centers throughout the United States. She was inducted into the US Olympic Hall of Fame and started an organization to help amateur track and field stars. In 1990, Rudolph became the first woman to receive the National Collegiate Athletic Association’s Silver Anniversary Award. The indoor track and dormitory at Tennessee State University are named in honor of Rudolph. In 1977, her life was the subject of a prime-time television movie. Rudolph died of a brain tumor on November 12, 1994.
Source: National Women's History Museum.
Photo: Tomaquag Indian Memorial Museum
Princess Red Wing, aka Mary E. (Glasko) Congdon, (March 21, 1896 – December 2, 1987) was a Narragansett and Wampanoag elder, historian, folklorist, and museum curator. She was an expert on American Indian history and culture, and she once addressed the United Nations.
A member of the Narragansett and Wampanoag tribes, Princess Red Wing dedicated her life to preserving Native American culture and history in New England and educating the public. She helped preserve many Narragansett oral traditions through her storytelling, founded the Tomaquag Indian Memorial Museum in Rhode Island and served as a member of the Speakers Research Committee of the under secretariat of the United Nations.
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