Today's Awesome Woman is: Ethel Percy Andrus (September 21, 1884 San Francisco, California – July 13, 1967) was a long-time educator and the first woman high school principal in California, but is better known as the founder of AARP in 1958. Andrus founded a separate organization, the National Retired Teachers Association (NRTA) in 1947.
She realized that retired teachers were living on incredibly small pensions, often without any health insurance. She approached more than 30 companies to offer health insurance to retired teachers, before she found someone willing to take a chance on NRTA members in 1956. The organization then expanded its membership to all retirees and became AARP in 1958.
Today, the NRTA is still a division of AARP, and serves as its educator community. AARP continues to follow Andrus’ guiding principles: Collective voice, collective purchasing power, and the collective ability to do good and give back through service. AARP continues to follow the motto she created, “To serve, not to be served.” According to its mission statement, it is "a nonprofit, nonpartisan membership organization for people age 50 and over ... dedicated to enhancing quality of life for all as we age," which "provides a wide range of unique benefits, special products, and services for our members."
More info at http://assets.aarp.org/www.aarp.org_/articles/NRTA/andrus_bio.pdf
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Tuesday, March 29, 2011
Saturday, March 26, 2011
Geraldine Ferraro
The Woman of the Day is Geraldine Ferraro, born in 1935 and died today. A savvy New York Democrat, she was an attorney, a Democratic Party notable, and a member of the U.S. House of Representatives (New York/Queens). In 1984 she was embraced as a symbol of women's equality when she became the first Italian-American and first woman to be a major-party Vice Presidential nominee, selected by Walter Mondale who tried to unseat Ronald Reagan.
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Friday, March 25, 2011
Hildegard of Bingen
The Awesome Woman of the Day is Hildegard of Bingen (1098 – 17 September 1179) A writer, composer, philosopher, Christian mystic, German Benedictine abbess, visionary, and polymath. She founded the monasteries of Rupertsberg in 1150 and Eibingen in 1165. One of her works as a composer, the Ordo Virtutum, is an early example of liturgical drama.
At a time when few women wrote, she wrote theological, botanical and medicinal texts, as well as letters, liturgical songs, poems, and arguably the oldest surviving morality play, while supervising brilliant miniature Illuminations.
When few women were accorded respect, she was consulted by and advised bishops, popes, and kings.
Hildegard was born a "10"th child (a tithe) to a noble family. As was customary with the tenth child, which the family could not count on feeding, she was dedicated at birth to the church. The girl started to have visions of luminous objects at the age of tree, but soon realized she was unique in this ability and hid this gift for many years.
search.eb.com
Hildegard was born of noble parents and was educated at the Benedictine cloister of Disibodenberg by Jutta, an anchorite and sister of the count of Spanheim. Hildegard was 15 years old when she began wearing the Benedictine habit and pursuing a religious life. She succeeded Jutta as prioress in 1136
At a time when few women wrote, she wrote theological, botanical and medicinal texts, as well as letters, liturgical songs, poems, and arguably the oldest surviving morality play, while supervising brilliant miniature Illuminations.
When few women were accorded respect, she was consulted by and advised bishops, popes, and kings.
At age 8, the family sent this strange girl to an anchoress named Jutta to receive a religious education. Jutta was born into a wealthy and prominent family, and by all accounts was a young woman of great beauty. She spurned all worldly temptations and decided to dedicate her life to god. Instead of entering a convent, Jutta followed a harsher route and became an anchoress. Anchors of both sexes, though from most accounts they seem to be largely women, led an ascetic life, shut off from the world inside a small room, usually built adjacent to a church so that they could follow the services, with only a small window acting as their link to the rest of humanity. Food would be passed through this window and refuse taken out. Most of the time would be spent in prayer, contemplation, or solitary handworking activities, like stitching and embroidering. Because they would become essentially dead to the world, anchors would receive their last rights from the bishop before their confinement in the anchorage. This macabre ceremony was a complete burial ceremony with the anchor laid out on a bier.
Hildegard's writings are also unique for their generally positive view of sexual relations and her description of pleasure from the point of view of a woman. They might also contain the first description of the female orgasm.
'When a woman is making love with a man, a sense of heat in her brain, which brings with it sensual delight, communicates the taste of that delight during the act and summons forth the emission of the man's seed. And when the seed has fallen into its place, that vehement heat descending from her brain draws the seed to itself and holds it, and soon the woman's sexual organs contract, and all the parts that are ready to open up during the time of menstruation now close, in the same way as a strong man can old something enclosed in his fist. '
'When a woman is making love with a man, a sense of heat in her brain, which brings with it sensual delight, communicates the taste of that delight during the act and summons forth the emission of the man's seed. And when the seed has fallen into its place, that vehement heat descending from her brain draws the seed to itself and holds it, and soon the woman's sexual organs contract, and all the parts that are ready to open up during the time of menstruation now close, in the same way as a strong man can old something enclosed in his fist. '
AWU post & comments at http://www.facebook.com/home.php?sk=group_343338393054&view=permalink&id=10150233079988055"The soul is a breath of living spirit, that with excellent sensitivity, permeates the entire body to give it life. Just so, the breath of the air makes the earth fruitful. Thus the air is the soul of the earth, moistening it, greening it."
Wednesday, March 23, 2011
Elizabeth Taylor
Today's Awesome Woman is Elizabeth Taylor. The linked-to obituary describes much about her life and even about her activism, but the two things for which I most remember her are that she took on the cause of AIDS when it was so popular to marginalize and ridicule its victims AND that the public turned on her really viciously when she gained some weight in the late 70s.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/local/obituaries/screen-legend-elizabeth-taylor-dies-at-age-79/2010/09/21/ABPFCYIB_story.html
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Tuesday, March 22, 2011
Aphra Behn
♥ ♥ ♥ Today's Awesome Woman is Aphra Behn (10 July 1640 – 16 April 1689) Novelist, dramatist and spy, she explored female sexuality at a time when it was an unapproachable topic.
Virginia Woolf wrote of her; "All women together, ought to let flowers fall upon the grave of Aphra Behn... for it was she who earned them the right to speak their minds."
http://www.luminarium.org/eightlit/behn/behnbio.htm
Virginia Woolf wrote of her; "All women together, ought to let flowers fall upon the grave of Aphra Behn... for it was she who earned them the right to speak their minds."
http://www.luminarium.org/eightlit/behn/behnbio.htm
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Harriet Beecher Stowe
♥ ♥ ♥ Today's Awesome Woman is Harriet Beecher Stowe (June 14, 1811 – July 1, 1896) was an American abolitionist and author. Her novel Uncle Tom's Cabin (1852) depicted life for African-Americans under slavery; it reached millions as a novel and play, and became influential in the United States and United Kingdom. It energized anti-slavery forces in the American North, while provoking widespread anger in the South.
The Fugitive Slave act prompted Harriet Beecher Stowe to write Uncle Tom's Cabin in 1851 as a serial in the abolitionist newspaper, The National Era. Her goal was to show the physical, sexual, and emotional abuse endured by enslaved people and the terrible impact of slavery on families.
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The Fugitive Slave act prompted Harriet Beecher Stowe to write Uncle Tom's Cabin in 1851 as a serial in the abolitionist newspaper, The National Era. Her goal was to show the physical, sexual, and emotional abuse endured by enslaved people and the terrible impact of slavery on families.
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Tuesday, March 15, 2011
Hypatia of Alexandria
♥ ♥ ♥ Today's Awesome Woman is Hypatia of Alexandria -Greek: Ὑπατία, Hypatía; born between AD 350 and 370; died March 415 was the only famous woman scholar in ancient Egypt. She is considered the first notable woman in mathematics, who also taught philosophy and astronomy.
www.thisiswomen.com
Hypatia of Alexandira (370-415) was the only famous woman scholar in ancient Egypt. She became a teacher and wrote many books on mathematics along with criticisms of philosophical and mathematical concepts.
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Thursday, March 10, 2011
Dorothea Mackellar
♥ ♥ ♥ Today's Awesome Woman is Dorothea Mackellar (1885-1968) At only 19 years of age she wrote one of the most infamous Australian poems 'My Country'. The immortal line 'I love a sunburnt country' from the poem is used again and again to describe Australia, appealing to the sense of patriotism fostered by the war and post-war nationalism.
http://www.dorotheamackellar.com.au/history.asp
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http://www.dorotheamackellar.com.au/history.asp
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Wednesday, March 9, 2011
Carole King
Today's Awesome Woman is Carole King, born February 9, 1942. She is a genius songwriter and, I think, one of the architects of pop music as a genre unto itself, as opposed to just whatever kind of music happens to be popular at any given time. She had her first hit at age 18 (Will You Love Me Tomorrow) and wrote more than 2 dozen hits during the 60s alone. She continues writing, singing, and touring, and her most recent record has sold more than 400k copies.
Tuesday, March 8, 2011
ALL WOMEN
Today’s Awesome Woman is : ♥ ALL WOMEN ♥ in commemoration of today being "International Womans Day."
Annually on March 8, thousands of events are held throughout the world to inspire women and celebrate achievements. A global web of rich and diverse local activity connects women from all around the world ranging from political rallies, business conferences, government activities and networking events through to local women's craft markets, theatric performances, fashion parades and more.
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Annually on March 8, thousands of events are held throughout the world to inspire women and celebrate achievements. A global web of rich and diverse local activity connects women from all around the world ranging from political rallies, business conferences, government activities and networking events through to local women's craft markets, theatric performances, fashion parades and more.
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Thursday, March 3, 2011
Elizabeth Siddal
♥ ♥ ♥ The Awesome Woman of The Day is Elizabeth Siddal (1829-1862) An artist's model for the Pre-Raphaelites, she was the face of Millais' Ophelia. Siddal was the primary muse for Dante Gabriel Rossetti throughout most of his youth.
In 1855 the art critic John Ruskin began to subsidize her career. Ruskin paid £150 per year in exchange for all drawings and paintings that she produced. Siddal produced many sketches but only a single painting. Ruskin also admonished Rossetti in his letters for not marrying Siddal and giving her the security she needed. During this period Siddal also began to write poetry, often with dark themes about lost love or the impossibility of true love.
In the previous ten years he had been engaged to her and then broken it off at the last minute several times. Stress from those incidents had affected her. She was now severely depressed and her long illness had given her access to and addiction to laudanum. In 1861, Siddal became pregnant. She was overjoyed about this, but the pregnancy ended in a stillborn daughter. Siddal overdosed on laudanum shortly after becoming pregnant for a second time. Rossetti discovered her unconscious and dying in bed. Although her death was ruled accidental by the coroner, there are suggestions that Rossetti found a suicide note.
Since watching the BBC series 'Desperate Romantics' Ive become a tad obsessed with Lizzie. What an amazing period of history she lived in. Her presence in that time has been captured for eternity. I would love to find more of her poetry.
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After he met her he began to paint her to the exclusion of almost all other models and stopped her from modelling for the other Pre-Raphaelites. After becoming engaged to Rossetti, Siddal began to study with him. In contrast to Rossetti's idealized paintings, Siddal's were harsh.
In 1855 the art critic John Ruskin began to subsidize her career. Ruskin paid £150 per year in exchange for all drawings and paintings that she produced. Siddal produced many sketches but only a single painting. Ruskin also admonished Rossetti in his letters for not marrying Siddal and giving her the security she needed. During this period Siddal also began to write poetry, often with dark themes about lost love or the impossibility of true love.
In the previous ten years he had been engaged to her and then broken it off at the last minute several times. Stress from those incidents had affected her. She was now severely depressed and her long illness had given her access to and addiction to laudanum. In 1861, Siddal became pregnant. She was overjoyed about this, but the pregnancy ended in a stillborn daughter. Siddal overdosed on laudanum shortly after becoming pregnant for a second time. Rossetti discovered her unconscious and dying in bed. Although her death was ruled accidental by the coroner, there are suggestions that Rossetti found a suicide note.
Since watching the BBC series 'Desperate Romantics' Ive become a tad obsessed with Lizzie. What an amazing period of history she lived in. Her presence in that time has been captured for eternity. I would love to find more of her poetry.
AWU post and comments at http://www.facebook.com/home.php?sk=group_343338393054&view=permalink&id=10150233082468055
Rose Mapendo
Rose Mapendo is a Tutsi Congolese from the Tutsi Banyamulenge tribe born in a remote village of Mulenge in East Congo. She was married like the majority of girls at a very early age (16 years) in 1979. She never been to school and was raised to become a wife and a mother. In 1994 she moved from her village to a big city called Mbujimayi (the capital city of Kasai Oriental) to give her six children a chance to attend school boys and girls alike, a chance she never had. Her and her husband who was educated started a successful Butcher business. Her husband was the only son of her parents. She and her husband wanted to have as many children as they can have. In 1998 Rose’s life became a nightmare.
http://mapendonewhorizons. org/node/34
Rose Mapendo, honored by the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees as The Humanitarian of the Year in 2009, and her brother Dr. Kigabo Mbazumutima, have launched Mapendo New Horizons ("MNH"). MNH is a non-profit organization committed to promoting health, peace, reconciliation and equity in African territories, including the Great Lakes region, where extreme violence and abuse have left countless survivors -- especially women and children -- in need of medical, emotional, and social healing. Rose Mapendo is no longer affiliated with Mapendo International in Boston, Massachusetts.
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http://mapendonewhorizons.
Rose Mapendo, honored by the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees as The Humanitarian of the Year in 2009, and her brother Dr. Kigabo Mbazumutima, have launched Mapendo New Horizons ("MNH"). MNH is a non-profit organization committed to promoting health, peace, reconciliation and equity in African territories, including the Great Lakes region, where extreme violence and abuse have left countless survivors -- especially women and children -- in need of medical, emotional, and social healing. Rose Mapendo is no longer affiliated with Mapendo International in Boston, Massachusetts.
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