- Frances Perkins (1880-1965), U.S. Secretary of Labor 1933-45, first woman in the Presidential Cabinet. She was a lifelong champion of labor from her collegiate social work days and, witnessing the 1911 Triangle factory fire, vowed "to spend my life fighting conditions that would permit such a tragedy." A leading architect of the New Deal, she greatly influenced all major modern legislation in favor of collective bargaining, retirement pensions, wage and hour laws, and unemployment benefits. Even so, male laborers were often among her opponents because of her efforts to help working women, children, minorities, and immigrants and because they felt a man should have her job. Conservative newspapers puffed the rumors that she was a foreign-born Jewish communist, citing her use of her maiden name as “evidence” of concealed identity. The House actually held impeachment hearings. Acquitted, she resumed her job and went on to teach labor courses at Cornell, working all her 85 years.
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