Ruth Benerito is a woman who helped rebuild the cotton industry when it was struggling at one point. She is a pioneer in the textile industry because she invented the easy-care cotton. By inventing the easy-care cotton, she saved the industry from drowning in the foreign competition. Ruth always had a love for science throughout her childhood, and her father pushed her continue her education. After graduating high school at the age of 14, she attended the all women’s college named Newcomb College. After accomplishing her degree, she struggled finding jobs because people were struggling after the Great Depression. She ended up working at a high school teaching math, science and a safety driving course. After World War II, she ended up finishing
Rebecca Sharpless’ book “Fertile Ground, Narrow Choices” tells the stories of everyday women in Central Texas on cotton farms. She argues that women were not just good for keeping house, cooking, sewing and raising children but that they were an essential key to the economy. Whether they were picking cotton alongside men or bearing children
The history of The Black Civil Rights Movement in the United States is a fascinating account of a group of human beings, forcibly taken from their homeland, brought to a strange new continent, and forced to endure countless inhuman atrocities. Forced into a life of involuntary servitude to white slave owners, African Americans were to face an uphill battle for many years to come. Who would face that battle? To say the fight for black civil rights "was a grassroots movement of ordinary people who accomplished extraordinary things" would be an understatement. Countless people made it their life's work to see the progression of civil rights in America. People like W.E.B. DuBois, Marcus Garvey, A Phillip Randolph, Eleanor Roosevelt, and many others contributed to the fight although it would take ordinary people as well to lead the way in the fight for civil rights. This paper will focus on two people whose intelligence and bravery influenced future generations of civil rights organizers and crusaders. Ida B.Wells and Mary Mcleod Bethune were two African American women whose tenacity and influence would define the term "ordinary to extraordinary".
There was a connection between the textile economy and social medicine. Both midwifery and the production of textiles were female occupations that relied on neighborly exchange, and they both fueled the economy. “The most experienced weavers, all of them women, extended the skills of their female neighbors in much the same way midwives extended the abilities of nurses and watchers (79). The economy relied on household production. There were two different family economies in Martha Ballard’s household that was based on the gender division of labor that had specific responsibilities. The men ran the public businesses and the women handled the housework. Every employee was a daughter or niece of the family, or a neighbor’s daughter. They were all fostered by Martha and her husband. The shuffling of young women in Hallowell contributed to the social web of the community. They would trade the production of cloth with neighbors and other families in the town. Martha would record the type of exchanges between neighbors, and the compensations for services that were performed. The Ballard household had many visitors throughout the years that she recorded in her diary, and the most common names were Mrs. Savage, Mrs. Woodward, Mrs. Hamlin, Mrs. Pollard, and Mrs. Burton (93). The constant visitors and exchange of goods is the most prevalent aspect of the strong social web in the community. During this
She authored numerous sociological texts that are still referenced today, and was responsible for incorporating research and statistical data into the legislative process. She also initiated several investigations into child labor infractions in factories across the country. Her help in drafting Franklin D. Roosevelt’s Social Security Act of 1935 provided a foundation for the future of social security. Her extensive contributions to the betterment of conditions for numerous disenfranchised groups earned her the title of one of American history’s most influential women, and in 1976 she was inducted into the Nebraska Hall of Fame (New World Encyclopedia, 2017).
After moving to Washington D.C. Barton began working as a clerk in the US Patent Office becoming the first woman to receive a government job and have a salary equal to a man’s. However her position was soon reduced to a copyist and then eliminated entirely.
I choose to do my biographical paper on Margaret Higgins Sanger, because I admire the work that she done and that is continuing to be done, because of her. She was one of eleven children born to Michael and Anne Higgins; a Roman Catholic working-class Irish American family; on September 14, 1879, in Corning, New York. Margaret’s father a man of the bottle and one who enjoyed talking politics, rather than earning the money needed to take care of such a large family, therefore she spent most of her life in poverty. While I think her father had an impact on the person Margaret grew up to be; it was her mother that really shaped her into the person she was. Along with the eleven children she birthed, Anne also had many miscarriages, Margaret believed that it was the many pregnancies that took a toll on her mother's health and contributed to her early death at the age of 40. (BIO, 2014)
...rt herself. She began washing miner’s clothes in Central City. She established a solid ground for herself when she met Lorenzo Bowman. He was an entrepreneur and gave her the opportunity to gather and save up $10,000 in her name. She was known for her generosity in helping African Americans move to Central City, using the money that she had saved up (Abbott, Leonard, Noel, 2013, pp. 217). Her significance was important in Central City as she helped build Central City through population.
Jane Long is known as the “Mother of Texas.” She earned this title after braving through many mishaps to stay with her husband, who was rebelling against Mexico, which includes scavenging for food, scaring off Native Americans, and even giving birth to her third child with no help. This makes her the first English speaking woman to give birth in Texas. She is a perfect example of Texas bravery.
Clothes, bandages, medical supplies, carpets, blankets, and many other common materials and supplies that we use daily are made from cotton. Hundreds of materials that we wear, sleep on, and walk on daily use cotton. Everyone in the world uses cotton in some way every day. Cotton contains very unique qualities which have made it into an extremely useful crop for hundreds of years all over the world. Cotton stands atop all charts as the most used fiber plant in every country. It held a very influential place in the economic system and influenced many world trade markets. Cotton known by its famous nickname of “King Cotton” in the U.S. was the driving factor behind the widespread and lucrative American slave trade in the Atlantic. Before and
Born on December 25, 1921, Clara grew up in a family of four children, all at least 11 years older than her (Pryor, 3). Clara’s childhood was more of one that had several babysitters than siblings, each taking part of her education. Clara excelled at the academic part of life, but was very timid among strangers. School was not a particularly happy point in her life, being unable to fit in with her rambunctious classmates after having such a quiet childhood. The idea of being a burden to the family was in Clara’s head and felt that the way to win the affection of her family was to do extremely well in her classes to find the love that she felt was needed to be earned. She was extremely proud of the positive attention that her achievement of an academic scholarship (Pryor, 12). This praise for her accomplishment in the field of academics enriched her “taste for masculine accomplishments”. Her mother however, began to take notice of this and began to teach her to “be more feminine” by cooking dinners and building fires (Pryor, 15). The 1830’s was a time when the women of the United States really began to take a stand for the rights that they deserved (Duiker, 552). Growing up in the mist of this most likely helped Barton become the woman she turned out to be.
Elizabeth “Bessie” Coleman was born on January 26, 1892 to Susan and George Coleman who had a large family in Texas. At the time of Bessie’s birth, her parents had already been married for seventeen years and already had nine children, Bessie was the tenth, and she would later have twelve brothers and sisters. Even when she was small, Bessie had to deal with issues about race. Her father was of African American and Cherokee Indian decent, and her mother was black which made it difficult from the start for her to be accepted. Her parents were sharecroppers and her life was filled with renter farms and continuous labor. Then, when Bessie was two, her father decided to move himself and his family to Waxahacie, Texas. He thought that it would offer more opportunities for work, if he were to live in a cotton town.
"Forgiveness" and "racism" are two words that usually do not go together. Surprisingly enough Picking Cotton tells the story of how Jennifer Thompson and Ronald Cotton showed the upmost forgiveness for a wrongful conviction that in part was caused due to the racism. Racism was surely present in the South in the early 1900 's, but historically one does not think racism was a major issue in the 80 's. In one man 's opinion, Ronald Cotton, the Burlington police had racist views that contributed to him serving a life imprisonment for a crime he never committed. In 1984 when two white women were raped by a black man, race played a role in convicting the wrong black man in Burlington, North Carolina. Ronald Cotton was wrongfully convicted by racism
Anne Hutchinson, of Massachusetts Bay, was a woman of Euro-American society in the early 17th century. Born in the late 16th century, Hutchinson was baptized into the Puritan church. She was self taught and learned also by reading the books within her father’s library. Her family was middle class and members of the church. Her father was a reverend. She married William Hutchinson a magistrate in the colony. Hutchinson like many other women played a role in child beari...
Ruth is Walter's wife. Her dream is to have a happy family but she also wants to be wealthy.
On March 13, 1933, Joan Ruth Bader was born in Brooklyn, New York, to Celia Amster and Nathan Bader (Salokar & Volcansek, 1996). Ruth had an older sister, Marilyn, but she passed away at the age of six from meningitis; Ruth was one year old at the time. Cecilia, Ruth’s mother, stayed home and took care of Ruth while she grew up. Cecilia made sure that Ruth worked diligently in school and taught her the value of hard work. Cecilia was diagnosed with cancer while Ruth was in high school and the day before her daughter’s graduation she passed away (Salokar & Volcansek, 1996). One of the greatest influences on Ruth’s life was her mother and the values she instilled in her from a young age. Two of the greatest lessons that Ruth learned from her mother was to be independent and to be a lady, and by that she meant not to respond in anger but to remain calm in si...