Women’s History Month is in March. We invite you to be curious and go deeper into the heritage months we honor in the United States.
In the 1970s, the movement to recognize women and their achievements gained momentum. It was first celebrated for a week and then a month. Britannica.com says, “Each March, Americans celebrate National Women’s History Month: a chance to recognize women’s varied, and often under-recognized, accomplishments throughout history.” This month aligns with with International Women’s Day on March 8.
The Minnesota History Center and the League of Women Voter’s present a comprehensive resource called, “Votes for Women.” This website is a great place to start learning about the achievements of women in the U.S. So much depends on the recognition and rights that comes from voting.
It’s important to remember when the 19th Amendment passed in 1920 not all women gained the right to vote. This is a clear example of systemic racism – when systems such as voting exclude people based on race. From the PBS American Experience article, Not All Women Gained the Vote in 1920, “The struggle for suffrage, which began for black women in the early 1800s, continued until activists such as Fannie Lou Hamer and Diane Nash won the passage of the Voting Rights Act of 1965, 200 years later.“
Did you know there are 21 Smithsonian Museums in Washington D.C. and none of them are dedicated to women’s history? There is an ongoing effort to build a Smithsonian American Women’s History Museum.
Read all the Valley Outreach Be Curious posts here.
What are some resources about women’s history that have moved you to learn more?
