Women’s History Month begins March 1. It’s a month designated to celebrate women’s achievements, talents, history, and aspirations. A month in which women’s efforts to achieve economic, social, and legal can be highlighted. So, it seems fitting to take a moment to highlight the timeline of events that led to this month with its focus on women.

The idea that women contribute to the historical record, have a history as valuable as the history made by men, and deserve the same legal and economic rights as men has always been an extremist one.

In 1776 Abigail Adams wrote a letter to her husband John who was attending a congress to discuss American independence from Britain while she remained at home running their farm and raising their children. I long to hear that you have declared an independency, she wrote, and by the way, in the new code of laws which I suppose it will be necessary for you to make, I desire you would remember the ladies, and be more generous and favorable to them than your ancestors. Do not put such unlimited power into the hands of the husbands. Remember, all men would be tyrants if they could.

A sentiment to which John responded, As to your extraordinary code of laws, I cannot but laugh.

It wasn’t until the early 20th century that Americans slowly saw women’s legal status change.

The Socialist Party of America organized the first Women’s Day on February 28, 1909 on the one-year anniversary of the 15,000 women who marched across New York City demanding shorter hours, better pay, and the right to vote. In 1913 socialists in Europe and America declared March 8 as International Women’s Day, a date that continues to be observed.

The 1913 postcard on the left explains the reason women wanted to vote: For the work of a day, For the taxes we pay, For the laws we obey, We want something to say.

The American campaign for women’s right to vote began in 1848 and proceeded on a state-by-state basis until August 18, 1920 when the 19^th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution was ratified. Two days later the Secretary of State signed the proclamation granting American women the right to vote. A mere twenty-eight words marked the beginning of change in women’s legal status. “The right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of sex.” The amendment did not, it should be noted, remove systemic impediments that prevented American citizens from voting. Neither did it change the legal or social status of women. The struggle for equality continued.

Fast-forward fifty years. In 1971, Congresswoman Bella Abzug of New York introduced House Joint Resolution 52 to designate August 26 as Women’s Equality Day. The resolution stated, in part, that Women’s Equality Day is a symbol of women’s continued fight for equal rights, and, that the president is authorized and requested to issue a proclamation annually in commemoration of women’s suffrage.

In 1978 the Celebration of International Women’s Day morphed into a Women’s History Week. Nine years later, in 1987, the National Women’s History Project petitioned Congress to pass Public Law 100-9 to designate the entire month of March as Women’s History Month.

“If they don’t give you seat at the table, bring a folding chair.” — Shirley Chisholm

In 1968, Shirley Chisholm began her first term in the United States Congress. She was the first African American woman to serve in Congress, and in 1972 became the first woman and first African American to seek nomination as president of the United States.

During her tenure in Congress, Chisholm championed racial and gender equality, fought poverty, and opposed the war in Vietnam. In her later years, Chisholm said, “I want to be remembered as a woman who dared to be a catalyst for change.”

Women’s History Month is a time to remember the courage and accomplishments of women from all walks of life. Today’s blog is the first of three blogs for Women’s History Month. The movement to establish Home Economics as a profession is the topic of my next blog. And the last will touch on the social trend of trad wife, a movement based in current social media.

Illustrations & A Few Sources

We Can Do it by J. Howard Miller 1942; Abigail Adams by Benjamin Blyth 1766; Votes for Women Postcard c1913; Bella Abzug, 1970s; Shirley Chisholm, 1972. Women’s Equality Day. National Women’s History Museum. Aug. 26, 2013. Debra Michals. “Shirley Chisholm.” National Women’s History Museum. 2015.

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The post March is Women’s History Month first appeared on Sandra Wagner-Wright.

While spending time sheltering-in-place at home, I, like many other people, considered previous pandemics. Many media stories compare COVID-19 to the 1918 H1N1 virus pandemic. But that event is one of many throughout history, including small pox, also known as the speckled monster, a virulent viral disease once endemic in Europe, Asia, and Arabia. It killed three out of every ten infected people, leaving the survivors with pockmarked scars, occasional blindness, and immunity to future exposure to the disease.

In 1562 at the age of 29, Queen Elizabeth I contracted the disease. Treatment consisted of prayer, balancing bodily humors through bloodletting, and wrapping the victim in a scarlet cloth that allowed red light to heal the rash and underlying disease.

Elizabeth survived with what was said to be light scarring, but for the rest of her life she applied a white facial mask mixture of vinegar and lead, illustrated by her portrait. Many believe the queen’s later hair loss and missing teeth can be attributed to lead poisoning.

Mary Montagu’s Discovery

Two hundred years later, small pox continued to kill 400,000 people a year. In 1715 Lady Mary Wortley Montagu survived the disease, emerging from her sickbed with scars and without eyelashes.

The next year, Mary accompanied her husband on his posting as British ambassador to Constantinople and made a significant discovery. In her experience, people in Constantinople seldom suffered from small pox. Mary’s investigations led her to a preventative treatment that may have originated in China. Writing home, Mary reported,

There is a set of old women, who make it their business to perform the operation, every autumn, in the month of September, when the great heat is abated. People send to one another to know if any of their family has a mind to have the small-pox; they make parties for this purpose, and when they are met (commonly fifteen or sixteen together) the old woman comes with a nut-shell full of the matter of the best sort of small-pox, and asks what vein you please to have opened. She immediately rips open that you offer her, with a large needle (which gives you no more pain than a common scratch) and puts into the vein as much matter as can lie upon the head of her needle, and after that, binds up the little wound.

Mary was so impressed and so desperate to protect her four-year-old son from the disease, she arranged for Dr. Charles Maitland to perform the procedure on her child. 

When Mary returned home, her discovery was treated with disdain until another small pox outbreak threatened London in 1721. Mary arranged to have her young daughter inoculated before an audience that included the King’s physician. Caroline, the Princess of Wales, sponsored further research by offering seven prisoners awaiting execution at Newgate Prison the chance to be inoculated instead. All survived.

Small Pox Inoculation in America

News of the procedure traveled to the American colonies where New England preacher Cotton Mather arranged for Dr. Zabdiel Boylston to inoculate his children. Inoculation carried a number of risks, including death, but the prospect of lifelong immunity to small pox persuaded people to undergo the treatment.

In 1764 John Adams postponed his wedding to Abigail during a small pox epidemic, and decided to undergo the three week procedure and recuperation. Several weeks before the procedure, doctors placed him on a diet excluding meat, milk and eggs which he ignored. Immediately before inoculation, he ingested a strong purgative to clear his system. John reported the worst part of the treatment was “a long and total abstinence from every thing in nature that has any taste, two heavy vomits, one heavy cathartick, four and twenty mercurial and antimonial pills, and three weeks close confinement to an house.”

 Twelve years later while John was away at the Continental Congress, Abigail took her four children under the age of eleven to her aunt and uncle’s house in Boston so Dr. Thomas Bullfinch could perform the inoculation. Afterwards, Abigail wrote John that “the little ones are very sick and puke every morning,” but otherwise doing well.

In 1796 Edward Jenner introduced a different method of inoculation. He observed that dairymaids often developed blisters from cow pox on their hands. People inoculated with cow pox pus had a milder after affect and still became immune from small pox. As this method became more accepted, rates of small pox dropped. The fight against small pox continued until 1980 when the World Health Organization declared the disease eradicated.

There are some lessons to draw from the small pox example. The most important one is that a vaccine against COVID-19 will be developed. Not as quickly as we would like, but not as slowly as the one that stopped small pox. Secondly, most remedies prescribed in the 16th century are not useful today. We no longer believe being wrapped in a red blanket will cure disease. Nor, I suggest, will ultra-violent light.

Until COVID-19 is under control, our preventatives are simple. Everyone should

• Washing their hands thoroughly several times a day
• Wear a face mask in public spaces
• Stay home as much as possible

???

Queen Elizabeth, c1575, The Darnely Portrait

Lady Mary Montague, 1716, by Charles Jervas

An Account of Small Pox by Boylston. Welcome Images.

John Adams, 1766, by Benjamin Blyth

Abigail Adams, 1766, by Benjamin Blyth

Portrait of Edward Jenner. Welcome Images

“Abigail Adams and the Inoculation Decision.” Presidential History Blog. Dec. 4, 2017.

“Love in the Time of Smallpox.” Plodding through the Presidents. Apr. 13, 2014.

Thomas Hager. “How One Daring Woman Introduced the Idea of Smallpox Inoculations to England.” Time. Mar. 5, 2019.

Marcy McCall MacBain. “Unhealthy Times of Queen Elizabeth I.” CEBM. Oct. 17, 2018.

The post VICTORY OVER SMALL POX first appeared on Sandra Wagner-Wright.