Where are the Women?

The year was 1979 and it was January. I was teaching English and Music at Wilson Jr. High School in Pasadena and was asked by the principal to arrange the display cases in the main hall to honor 2 great civil rights leaders: Susan B. Anthony and Martin Luther King, Jr. Although it was not a nationally observed holiday, in California the push was to have a day where suffrage for all Americans was commemorated. That was the original flavor of the holiday.

In 1983, President Reagan signed a law making Martin Luther King, Jr., Day a national holiday and it was first observed by all 50 states in 2000.

But what happened to Susan B. Anthony? The same thing that happened to her dollar, the "Susie." It's gone--a relic. Both my mother and my grandmother were born in a country that did not allow women to vote.

We forget too quickly.

Susan Brownell Anthony February 15, 1820–March 13, 1906

Martin Luther King, Jr. January 15, 1929 – April 4, 1968