On this day in 1945, Esther Rome was born. She cofounded the Boston Women’s Health Book Collective and cowrote Our Bodies, Ourselves. Its discussion of women’s health emphasized self-ownership and empowerment. The book became an indispensable reference for generations of women. #WeTheMen

On this day in 1968, feminists from New York Radical Women led a protest of the Miss America pageant in Atlantic City. The protest featured a “freedom trash can” where women could throw away “bras, girdles, curlers, false eyelashes,” etc. Contrary to myth, feminists did not burn any bras. #WeTheMen

On this day in 1860, Jane Addams was born. She became a social reformer & the first US woman to win the Nobel peace prize. She said: “the good we secure for ourselves is precarious & uncertain, is floating in mid-air, until it is secured for all of us & incorporated into our common life.” #WeTheMen

OTD in 1939, Claudette Colvin was born. In 1955, a few months before Rosa Parks, Colvin was arrested for refusing to give up her seat to a white woman on a segregated Montgomery bus. The NAACP decided to focus on Parks b/c Colvin (age 15) was “mouthy,” “emotional,” “feisty” & pregnant. #WeTheMen

On this day in 2016, Phyllis Schlafly died. She blocked ERA ratification in the 70s & 80s, in part by denying the persistence of discrim against women. Here’s an article where I explore how Schlafly created a playbook that anti-feminists have followed since. #WeTheMen
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On this day in 1912, the men of Ohio voted against extending the franchise to women. A leader of Ohio’s woman suffrage organization observed that “Ohio is reactionary, terribly so.” The Cleveland Plain Dealer proved her point by identifying her only as “Mrs. William Neil King.” #WeTheMen