Women Making History: The Revolutionary Feminist Postcard Art of Helaine Victoria Press

Mary Antin’s (1881-1949) novel The Promised Land (1912) is a compelling account of immigrant passage to and settlement in America. Antin arrived in Boston in 1894, three years after her father fled the Russian Jewish Pale of Settlement in search of a better life. Her autobiographical account describes a metamorphosis from a provincial, inquisitive girl of the small town of Polotzk to a fervently patriotic American teenager. Antin’s work reflects her extraordinary sensitivity to the trauma of immigration and acculturation Page 307 →experienced by Eastern European Jews. Throughout her life, she remained a champion of the stranger and an advocate for liberal immigration legislation. Her book They Who Knock at Our Gates: A Complete Gospel of Immigration argued that open immigration is integral to the ideal of American democracy. Antin was the voice for the silent, aware that “while the great can speak for themselves, or by the tongues of their admirers, the humble are apt to live inarticulate and die unheard.” She described herself in The Promised Land as “one... born among the simple with a taste for self-revelation. The man or woman thus endowed must speak, will speak, though there are only the grasses in the field to hear, and none but the wind to carry the tale.”

The uprising of 20,000 shirtwaist workers in 1909 was the “largest strike of women ever known in U.S.” Idealistic Jewish women with roots in Russian socialism and union struggles were the force behind the strike. The industry employed 30-40,000 workers in NYC—2/3 Jewish and 80% women—in dismal sweatshops. Low wages, poor working conditions, and sexual abuse were among the grievances. Beginning in September 1909, women picketing against two employers were arrested, beaten, and harassed by hired thugs and police. At a mass meeting at Cooper Union on November 22, speakers debated the question of a general strike. Finally, Clara Lemlich (1886-1982), a young Jewish worker who had been among the first strikers, delivered an impassioned speech in Yiddish, the native tongue of the majority of shirtwaist workers, calling for a general strike. Instantly the crowd was on its feet shouting its emphatic affirmation. Within a few Page 308 →days, 30,000 shirtwaist workers were on strike. The Women's Trade Union League and wealthy and middle class women actively supported the strikers, forming a unique bond. The strike was settled on February 15. Despite a disappointing settlement, striking women awakened the public to problems facing women workers; the important issue of unionizing Black women came to the fore; the women gained an understanding of their strength in union and in number; and the “great uprising” became a catalyst for the rest of the industry.

Rosa Sonneschein (1847-1932) was the flamboyant editor and publisher of The American Jewess, the first independent American Jewish magazine published by a woman for women. After every meal, Sonneschein relaxed with her favorite cigar, "Between the Acts." She had taken up the habit when her physician suggested that an after-dinner smoke might prevent the indigestion she suffered from constant dinner disputes with her husband. When her four children were grown, she terminated her disastrous marriage and turned to publishing as a means of livelihood. Her magazine boasted 29,000 subscribers during its brief run (1895-99). She brought to the magazine her great storytelling ability along with a global view on people and events. Most articles were written by women and covered social and religious issues as well as literature. In one editorial she wrote "The New Woman! The New Woman! is the cry on every side. But where, oh where, lingers the New Man? Is he looming on the horizon, or will the feminine phoenix still have to content herself with the Old Specimen?" After attending the first Zionist Congress in Page 309 →Basel (1897), she wrote about women’s disenfranchisement within this emerging socio-political movement. She saw no conflict between her feminism and her liberal Judaism and was impatient with all who failed to recognize women’s religious equality and their potential power as change agents in the community.

The National Council of Jewish Women grew out of the Jewish Women’s Congress of the 1893 World’s Columbian Exposition in Chicago. Early members were politically and religiously liberal and established themselves as pioneers in Jewish education and philanthropy. Hannah Greenebaum Solomon (1858-1942) and Sadie American (1862-1944) were the prime movers behind both the Congress and the permanent organization, despite their very different personal styles. The cultured Solomon, who called herself “a confirmed women’s rights-er,” became the first president of Council (1893-1905), and forthright American served as corresponding and subsequently executive secretary until her forced retirement in 1914. Both women also worked for social change and women’s rights through other organizations. Solomon, a friend of Jane Addams, promoted women’s club work locally, nationally, and internationally; in 1904, as a delegate to the International Council of Women in Berlin, she used her linguistic skills to act as Susan B. Anthony’s interpreter. American, an ardent fighter against the international white slave traffic, was active in many progressive organizations, including the Consumer’s League and the National Education Association. Today the National Council of Jewish Women is Page 310 →known across the U.S. for its creation and support of innovative social and educational programs.

Emma Tenayuca, born 1916 in San Antonio, Texas. A courageous Chicana labor leader whose commitment to justice led her to a militant stand against hunger, misery, and unemployment of the Great Depression. From 1934-48, she supported almost every strike in the city, writing leaflets, visiting homes of strikers, and joining them on picket lines. First knowledge of the plight of workers came from visits to the "Plaza del Zacate," the Trafalgar Square of SA where socialists and anarchists came to speak. Contact with fired workers led her to join the Communist Party in 1937 and the Workers Alliance in 1936, an organization of the unemployed founded by Socialists and Communists, 90% of whom were pecan shellers and agricultural workers. The WA held demonstrations for jobs, not relief, and demanded that Mexican workers had the right to strike without fear of deportation, and to a minimum wage and hour law. When 12,000 pecan shellers marched out of the factories in 1938, Tenayuca was unanimously elected strike leader. In retrospect she says, "What started out as a movement for organization for equal wages turned into a mass movement against starvation, for civil rights, for a minimum wage law, and it changed the character of West Side San Antonio."

Helaine Victoria Press asked a number of the women honored on their postcards if they would autograph ten copies. This one Emma Tenayuca inscribed to Vicky Leighty, with whom she had spent several hours on the telephone, providing information for the caption on the reverse side of the postcard. Emma Tenayuca, born 1916 in San Antonio, Texas. A courageous Chicana labor leader whose commitment to justice led her to a militant stand against hunger, misery, and unemployment of the Great Depression. From 1934-48, she supported almost every strike in the city, writing leaflets, visiting homes of strikers, and joining them on picket lines. First knowledge of the plight of workers came from visits to the “Plaza del Zacate,” the Trafalgar Square of SA where socialists and anarchists came to speak. Contact with fired workers led her to join the Communist Party in 1937 and the Workers Alliance in 1936, an organization of the unemployed founded by Socialists and Communists, 90% of whom were pecan shellers and agricultural workers. The WA held demonstrations for jobs, not relief, and demanded that Mexican workers had the right to strike without fear of Page 305 →deportation, and to a minimum wage and hour law. When 12,000 pecan shellers marched out of the factories in 1938, Tenayuca was unanimously elected strike leader. In retrospect she says, “What started out as a movement for organization for equal wages turned into a mass movement against starvation, for civil rights, for a minimum wage law, and it changed the character of West Side San Antonio.”

Mary McLeod Bethune (1875-1955) was one of seventeen children of Samuel and Patsy McLeod, slaves on the McLeod plantation in Maysville, South Carolina. Born after the Emancipation, Mary McLeod was a free woman. Seeing the overriding importance of real freedom and equality, she became a powerful force in the emerging struggle for civil rights. As an educator, she established a school for Black girls in 1904, and within 20 years she transformed it into a college. She was a valued counselor to four presidents, director of a major government agency, founder of the National Council of Negro Women, and a consultant to world figures seeking to build universal peace through the United Nations. As president of NCNW, Bethune implemented programs addressing the problems of Black women, the Black community, and the world community. Her deepest interest was in the education of women, and she led a voter registration drive in 1920 for Black women. She expanded the NCNW and launched the Aframerican Woman’s Journal. Her philosophy for the NCNW was to “visualize a growing oneness in purpose; a growing release from selfishness; ... a growing consciousness in our own souls that we work and serve NOT FOR OURSELVES, BUT FOR OTHERS!” Bethune was a powerful speaker; she marched for civil rights, and picketed businesses which discriminated against Blacks. Through her words and actions, she was one of the most influential and inspiring Black leaders in the country.

Jane Addams (1860-1935), social reformer and pacifist. Traveling in 1888, she discovered Toynbee Hall in London, known as the prototype of the settlement house. Her belief that the settlement offered the opportunity for a mutually enriching life for herself, and others led her to found Hull House, with Ellen Gates Starr, in Chicago in 1889. The working-class, ethnic neighbors flocked to the classes, clubs, day nursery, gymnasium, dispensary, concerts, plays, exhibits, and other functions of the settlement. Hull House was a headquarters of education and labor reform, and a major political influence. An era Page 292 →of voluntarism began among women, and thousands of centers modeled on Hull House sprang up over the next 30 years, including the University of Chicago Settlement, headed by Mary McDowell (1854-1936). McDowell was an early resident of Hull House, and she and Addams were devoted friends. Untiring in their pursuits, they aroused public attention to improve industrial districts. Called “Mary the Magnificent,” McDowell was a trade union organizer who chaired the committee advocating what became the 19-volume national investigation on women workers. Addams was a lifelong feminist and founder of the Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom, and McDowell worked for peace through the League of Nations. Addams believed that the passionate desire for good will and human understanding among nations would sweep away the impulses for war and that peace education could be as infectious as war propaganda.

Madam C. J. Walker (1867-1919). Businesswoman. Philanthropist. Inventor. Confidence Builder. Born Sarah Breedlove in Delta, LA, she was a laundress until 1905 when she formulated hair and scalp preparations especially for Black women. When she died at 51, she had become the first self-made American woman millionaire. She traveled extensively promoting her products and speaking out on issues affecting women and Blacks. Thousands of Walker agents, nearly all women, sold her “Wonderful Hair Grower” in the U.S., Central America, and the Caribbean. More than 200 agents met in Page 295 →Philadelphia in 1917 to hear Madam speak about “Women’s Duty to Women” at the first convention of the Mme. C. J. Walker Hair Culturists' Union of America. That same summer Mme. Walker was the only woman in a group of Black men who visited the White House to petition President Woodrow Wilson to make lynching a federal crime. Mme. Walker contributed generously to educational and other causes in which she believed, including Mary McLeod Bethune’s Bethune-Cookman College. Madam’s Irvington-on-Hudson, N.Y. mansion, ‘Villa Lewaro’, was the site for important meetings of Black leaders. The Walker Co. still is in Indianapolis, manufacturing Madam Walker’s original formulas. As was her wish, the company president has always been a woman.

Madam C. J. Walker (1867-1919). Businesswoman. Philanthropist. Inventor. Confidence builder. Born Sarah Breedlove in Delta, LA, she was a laundress until 1905, when she first formulated hair and scalp preparations especially for Black women. When she died, at 51, she had become the first self-made U.S. woman millionaire. She traveled extensively, promoting her products and speaking out on issues affecting women and Blacks. Thousands of Walker agents, nearly all women, sold her "Wonderful Hair Grower" in the U.S., Central America, and the Caribbean. More than 200 agents met in Philadelphia in 1917 to hear Madam speak about "Women's Duty to Women" at the first convention of the Mme. C. J. Walker Hair Culturists' Union of America. That same summer Mme. Walker was the only woman in a group of Black men who visited the White House to petition President Woodrow Wilson to make lynching a federal crime. Mme. Walker contributed generously to educational and other causes, in which she believed, including Mary McLeod Bethune's Bethune-Cookman College. Madam's Irvington-on-Hudson, NY, mansion, "Villa Lewaro," was the site of important meetings of Black leaders. The Walker Co. still is in Indianapolis, manufacturing Madam Walker's original formulas. It was Madam's wish that the company president always be a woman.

Edmonia Lewis (1843-1890). Sculptor. Daughter of a Chippewa Indian mother and a Black father, her heritage greatly influenced her work. Orphaned before age five, she was raised by her mother’s tribe as Wildfire. When she enrolled at Oberlin College with financial support from her brother, she changed her name. During the Civil War, in 1862, she moved to Boston and began her career as a sculptor, modeling anti-slavery leaders. Page 326 →The sale of her work enabled her to go to Italy in 1865 to further her study and have access to marble. Although working in the Neoclassic style, her art expressed her concern with slavery and racial oppression. Her work reflected the dignity of her Indian roots and, as she put it, conveyed a “strong sympathy for all women who have struggled and suffered.” She was welcomed in Rome and became part of the circle of independent women artists who included Harriet Hosmer, Charlotte Cushman, and Anne Whitney. Lewis executed many large compositions herself unlike other sculptors, believing this made her work truly original. Though she confronted racial and sexual barriers, she attained professional success both in the U.S. and Europe.

“Rosie the Riveter.” Women’s place in the workforce was radically changed by WWII. New popular images in propaganda, like “Rosie the Riveter,” were used to recruit women to fill war-time defense jobs which suffered from the “man” power shortage caused by the war. Black women, along with older and married women, for the first time found exciting new opportunities open to them in non-traditional, skilled, and highly paid jobs. Nearly 20 million women were active in the workforce during the war, 6.5 million for the first time. The number of women in heavy manufacturing increased 460%. Overnight, women were trained to be shipbuilders, welders, riveters, and machine workers. In addition, they became the train conductors, bus drivers, lumberjacks and police which sustained the nation. When WWII came to an end, new propaganda was produced which encouraged women to leave the workforce so the returning soldiers could resume their old jobs. Although women were laid off in great numbers, 80% of them wanted to keep their skilled jobs, and many of the “Rosies” stayed in the workforce but were forced to return to their traditional unskilled positions.

Front cover for nine postcards in a folio set. Women in American Labor Movement: Organized Struggle in the Workplace 1886-1986, in recognition of the Centennial of the Haymarket Tragedy and the First International Celebration of May Day.

Page 313 →Back cover for nine postcards in a folio set. Women in American Labor Movement: Organized Struggle in the Workplace 1886–1986, in recognition of the Centennial of the Haymarket Tragedy and the First International Celebration of May Day.

Page 314 →Sit-down strikes dominated the headlines in 1937 and were a reaction to the strikebreaking tactics used at the time. Sit-downs were effective weapons: workers had less fear that their jobs would be taken by scabs, and employers were reluctant to use violence or prolong negotiations for fear of damage to their property. Some sit-downs were small, while others such as the General Motors strike in Flint, Michigan involved 140,000 workers sitting in for 44 days until the UAW achieved victory. Patterned after the Flint strike, Woolworth’s in Detroit was the first 5 and 10 cent store to sit-down and win a contract The strike spread to New York where sit-downs proved effective at other 5 and 10s. The mostly women strikers at Woolworth’s were led by Local 1250 Department Store Workers’ Union, with Clarina Michelson the strike leader. The settlement was based on a 48-hour week, a minimum weekly wage of $15.60 (a dollar increase) and paid vacations. In 1939, the Supreme Court declared sit-downs illegal, but they had already proved to be a valuable weapon and anticipated the sit-ins of the Civil Rights movement and the 1960s student strikes and Vietnam War protests.

Voltairine de Cleyre (1866-1912). American anarchist, freethinker, and feminist. Born in rural Michigan and educated in a Catholic convent, she converted to anarchism after the hanging of the Haymarket Martyrs in 1887. Most of her adult life was spent in Philadelphia, where she was a founder of the Ladies’ Liberal League and a teacher among the Jewish immigrant poor. An inspired speaker and writer, she published hundreds of poems, essays, and stories, mainly on themes of social rebellion, in Mother Page 315 →Earth and other journals of the day. Wounded by an assassin in 1902, she refused to press charges, returning good for evil in the spirit of Tolstoy. During her last years, she was arrested after a free-speech demonstration in Philadelphia, supported the Mexican Revolution, and taught at an anarchist school in Chicago, where she died in 1912. She was buried in the Waldheim Cemetery, beside the graves of the Haymarket anarchists whose martyrdom had inspired her life. Emma Goldman called her “the poet-rebel, the liberty loving artist, the greatest woman anarchist of America.”

Dolores Huerta (b. 1930). Chicana labor leader and first vice president of the United Farm Workers of America. Growing up in Stockton, California, she learned organizing skills through the Community Service Organization and the AFL-CIO sponsored Agricultural Workers Organizing Committee to help migrant Mexican and Chicano farm laborers. A co-founder of the UFW (1962), Huerta has dedicated her life to the struggle for justice, dignity, and a decent standard of living for agricultural workers. She has served as UFW picket captain, organizer, chief contract negotiator, New York boycott director, field office director, and Executive Board member. Her activism has resulted in numerous arrests. Her lobbying and testimony before Congress and the California state legislature has brought the migrant workers’ struggle to the attention of lawmakers. She continues to carry the union’s nonviolent message to the American public and inspires many other women who have chosen to serve La Causa.

Blue Collar Asian Women (BCAW) was formed in San Francisco in 1982 as a support group and social network for Asian women working in the skilled trades and for those wishing to do so. BCAW works to improve conditions for Asian women in non-traditional work and to make certain that Asian women’s issues are addressed. Individual members also work with such organizations as Chinese for Affirmative Action and Tradeswomen, Inc. Activities include participating in job fairs, community events, demonstrations and political rallies. Breaking into male dominated occupations such as the skilled crafts trades, women must often confront sexism, sexual harassment, and racism. The success and pioneering achievements of these women in non-traditional occupations present positive role models which counteract the traditional stereotypes of women.

Rose Pesotta (1896-1965). Russian-Jewish labor organizer and anarchist. Born in the Ukraine, she was involved there in radical underground circles. After coming to the U.S. in 1913, she became a dressmaker. She was active in Local 25 of the International Ladies’ Garment Workers’ Union and soon became a paid organizer. In 1934, her organizing abilities were recognized when she was elected vice president of the union, the third woman to ever be a vice president of ILGWU. In 1936, she was a CIO organizer for the Akron and Flint rubber workers’ strikes. Pesotta was a flamboyant and articulate speaker Page 317 →as well as a tireless activist, none of which spared her from harassment, beatings, and arrests. She worked for the Sacco and Vanzetti defense committee and tried to gain entry to the U.S. for her friend Emma Goldman. After a long and colorful career as a labor organizer, she returned to the sewing machine. She also wrote two autobiographies, Bread Upon the Waters (1945) and Days of Our Lives (1958). Combining her labor organization with factory work reflects her belief that all officers “should stay closely connected to the conditions under which the rank and file were working.”

Maida Springer-Kemp (b. 1910). Labor leader, international representative. Born in Panama, Kemp is a naturalized U.S. citizen who came to New York with her mother at seven. Her first union activity began during the 1933 General Strike of the International Ladies’ Garment Workers’ Union as a member of the Dressmakers’ Union. Thousands of workers responded to the call, mostly women, and for the first time many Black women. They struck gladly to protest the sweatshop conditions. Kemp’s commitment to the union movement has been a source of “great excitement and great challenge.” Her lifelong work includes local union board member (1940s); an AFL delegate to England (1945); education director of a local union; business agent for the Dressmakers’ union (1946-1959); international representative for AFL-CIO assigned to Africa (1959-1965); general organizer for the ILGWU and Mid-West Director of the A. Philip Randolph Institute; throughout the 70s, consultant to the AFL-CIO sponsored African and Asian Institutes. About her work, she says: “You were doing it not for yourself, surely you benefited, but Page 318 →on behalf of a larger citizenship, for whom dignity, respect, and the workers’ role was emphasized. For me this has always been a privilege.”