Henrietta Hay's Column

I read in the Sentinel last month "Today's female executives assumed leadership roles without fanfare or warfare...absent the sexual-revolution warfare commonplace to more liberal communities."

Well now, let's back up and punt.

Does anybody seriously think that back in 1965 most of today's female executives would have held the jobs they have today? What do they think those of us a generation older were we doing back in the 60's and 70's? Why did we become active in the new women's movement and march for the E. R. A. and stick our necks out at work, and start to elect women to office? Why did we take the ridicule and vituperation and constant criticism and keep coming back?

Certainly the picture is different today. I am very proud of the women, who have worked their way into positions of power and prestige, and I am sure that most of them understand very well what went before and the debt they owe. To pretend that the Gloria Steinems and Bella Abzugs and the Betty Friedans and the Geraldine Ferraros had nothing to do with the position of women in society today is not unlike saying that such progress as African-Americans have made toward civil rights would have taken place without Rosa Parks and Dr. King.

This is a conservative community, but it is not moribund. The wave of feminism that swept the country 25 years ago not skip over Grand Junction.

One evening in 1972 a dozen or so women from three different traditional local organizations were sitting around Carole's fireplace discussing this new women's movement and what it could mean to us. As we talked we started to make a list of goals for women in the community. Then somebody pulled out a list of objectives of the newly formed National Organization for Women. Much to our amazement, they matched almost exactly. And so NOW came to Happy Valley.

My records of those early years show a membership varying from 20 to 30 women with nearly two hundred on the mailing list. Every member became an instant activist. Many of those first pioneers still live here, and are active in the community.

The first project was to set up Task Forces. Two of the early ones, in addition to the political and economic ones, were the Rape Task Force and the Battered Women Task Force. At that time rape was generally considered to be the woman's fault, and the victim had almost no place to go for help. Battered women also had no resources available to them. These two groups were very active, and later became part of the Women's Resource Center, which is now the Resource Center.

Of course the whole idea of equality for women in government and the workplace was revolutionary and met with strenuous opposition. One night we were meeting in the Mantey Heights home of one member when a bunch of males burned a cross in the yard.

We were called pushy broads, bra burners, libbers and other words not suitable for a family newspaper. But we opened the door; we got their attention.

Today women are beginning to reap the benefits of those years of turmoil. They are taking their place in positions of authority, here and nationwide. We have women doctors and dentists, entrepreneurs and athletes, lawyers and mechanics, C. P. A.'s and truck drivers. And their wages have risen to .74 for every $1.00 a man earns!

This did not come about "absent the sexual revolution commonplace in more liberal communities." A little piece of it happened right here in Grand Junction. We have the scars to prove it. What seemed so radical in 1970 is often considered to be mainstream today. That's why it bothers me so to hear women say, "I'm not a feminist - but" -- but I want the right to choose all the things those women fought for: the right have a career or be a stay at home mother -- or both, the right to a professional education, the right to earn as much as a man, the right to financial, political and social equality with men.

It is essential that our daughters and granddaughters realize that real equality is still far away and now it's up to them. Feminism is not a dirty word.