New Coloring Book: Remembering the Ladies by Carol Simon Levin to be Released in October!

Hello and Welcome to the Girls Succeed blog. 

I'm excited to introduce you to my friend, author, speaker, librarian, Carol Simon Levin. She has created an amazing coloring book, “Remembering the Ladies” celebrating over 50 courageous and tenacious women who fought for equality. She plans to have the book published in October 2016.

Carol--Why is this coloring book different?

• It’s not “just” a coloring book! 
  • Each coloring page will have a short bio, a fascinating fact and a quote by the woman.  The book will include resources for more reading (I’m a librarian after all!) and places where these women are honored.
  • So, it’s a great educational resource in addition to being fun.
• It’s inclusive and diverse, just like the women in the book. 

Here's the image for the coloring book created by Laura Davidson

Today we are privileged to be one of the first to have a sneak peek at some pages from the coloring book. Carol is sharing the story and coloring page about Shirley Chisholm, The first black congresswoman in the USA. In 1972, Shirley Chisholm decided to run for the highest office in the land -- president!  She knew she couldn't win but she wanted a way to speak to all of America about the poor, minorities, and the Vietnam War.   She campaigned hard but won only 152 votes at the Democratic convention, a tiny fraction of the 3000 needed to win. Read more about Shirley below.

Shirley Chisholm (1924-2005)  "Unbought & Unbossed"

Born in Brooklyn to immigrant laborer parents, Shirley spent her primary school years with her grandmother in her parents' homeland of Barbados.  She appreciated the excellent education she received there in a one room strict British-style school -- writing in her 1970 autobiography, "If I speak and write easily now, that early education is the main reason."  Shirley returned to the states in 1934 and later enrolled in the integrated Girl's High in Brooklyn, continuing on to get a B.A. at Brooklyn College.  Though she was a prize debater there, she never  dreamed of running for political office -- who would vote for a black woman with a Caribbean accent?  She married, taught nursery school and earned a Masters in Education from the Teacher's College at Columbia University in 1952.  Over the next decade, she became director of two day care centers. 

Seeing the difficulties faced by the families, Shirley became an advocate for early education and child welfare and in 1965, she was elected to the New York State Assembly. There she succeeded  in getting  unemployment benefits extended to domestic workers and sponsored legislation which gave disadvantaged students the chance to enter college.  In 1968, when a new seat was created in a district with African American, Jewish, and Latino voters, Shirley decided to run and, after a tough race, she won.   She was the nation's first black congresswoman.   In Washington,  she staffed her office entirely with women -- surprising everyone since women in most Congressional offices were  few and far between, with the exception of secretaries.   She spoke out strongly against the Vietnam War calling it "immoral, unjust, and unnecessary" and said that the money spent on war would be much better spent helping people with housing, food, and educational programs. 

In 1972, Shirley Chisholm decided to run for the highest office in the land -- president!  She knew she couldn't win but she wanted a way to speak to all of America about the poor, minorities, and the Vietnam War.   She campaigned hard but won only 152 votes at the Democratic convention, a tiny fraction of the 3000 needed to win.  Shirley returned to Congress and continued to fight for the change she believed in.  Later she became a professor at Mt. Holyoke College teaching politics and women's studies  and co-founded the National Political Congress of Black Women.  Once asked how she wished to be remembered, she said she'd like her gravestone to read "Shirley Chisholm had guts."*   In 2015, Shirley Chisholm was posthumously awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom.

Fascinating Factoid: In the 2008 Democratic presidential primary season,  Barack Obama and Hillary Rodham Clinton staged their historic 'firsts' battle – the victor would either be the first major party African-American nominee, or the first woman nominee – but Chisholm's 1972 campaign paved the way for both of them!

Read More:  For Adults:  Unbought and Unbossed by Shirley Chisholm (Expanded 40th Anniversary Ed.) 2010. (Also 2005 DVD: Chisholm '72: Unbought and Unbossed), Shirley Chisholm: Catalyst for Change, by Barbara Winslow, 2014.  For Kids:  Shirley Chisholm by Jill S. Pollack, 1994.

Visit: The Shirley Chisholm Center for Research on Women at Brooklyn College.  Brooklyn, NY. 

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A companion program will be available for booking in the fall of 2016. Contact Carol for scheduling this or any of her other performances.  You can also keep up-to-date on all her programs at her Facebook Page.

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I supported Carol's Remembering the Ladies kickstarter project. If you would be interested in learning more about this unique book and supporting the publishing of it, please visit the kickstarter page at https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/tellingherstories/remembering-the-ladies-a-coloring-book 

Carol has contributed articles to the Girls Succeed blog about trailblazing women. Click on the names to read about them.

Aviator Elinor Smith 

Aida de Acosta: the New Jersey Girl who became the "First Woman Aero-driver in the World!" 

Bridge Builder Emily Warren Roebling 

Trailblazer: Aida de Acosta, the First Woman Aero-driver in the World

                        Telling Herstories: Fascinating Women History Forgot 

by Carol Simon Levin

© Carol Simon Levin 2013  www.tellingherstories.wordpress.com

Aida de Acosta: the New Jersey Girl

who became the "First Woman Aero-driver in the World!"

Aida de Costa Breckinridge can be seen
at the controls of Alberto Santos -Dumont's powered
 "run-about balloon"over the skies of Paris on June 29,1903.
Image from blogdumonzinho.blogspot.com

            One hundred and ten years ago on December 17, 1903, the Wright Brothers made their famous first flight -- launching their fragile airplane on a beach in Kitty Hawk and showing that controlled, powered, heavier-than-air flight was possible (at least for 59 seconds!) 

            But did you know that more than five months before the Wright Brother’s flight, a Cuban-American girl from Long Branch, New Jersey became the first woman in the world to pilot a motorized aircraft?

            During the summer of 1903, Miss Aida de Acosta was visiting Paris with some school friends when she saw a most curious contraption -- a personal dirigible being driven by its inventor, a Brazilian by the name of Alberto Santos-Dumont.  Long before the cartoon Jetsons depicted personal aero-cars, Alberto Santos-Dumont traversed city boulevards in his “Runabout IX” a steerable, motorized balloon running errands -- traveling between his cafe, his personal jeweler Louis Cartier, and his hat-shop (putting out frequent fires on the airship was hard on hats!)  Sometimes when he reached a cafe, he would tether the dirigible on a lamppost and ask the waiters to send up a cup of coffee or glass of champagne!

            Aida was fascinated by his aero-ship and asked for lessons. Mr. Santos-Dumont agreed to teach her with the dirigible tethered in the hanger.  Since the machine had only one seat, he shouted out instructions from the ground.  He showed her how to steer the rudder, shift ballast,  drop weights, and use the three speed lever to work the propellers.  After three lessons, he pronounced her ready for a real flight. 

            June 29th, 1903 dawned clear and windless and, with his typical showmanship, Alberto decided the important polo match being held that day at the Bagatelle Polo Grounds would make a perfect destination.  He would ride below the balloon on a girl’s bicycle (so as not to catch  his opera cloak on a middle bar!) and give directions with a handkerchief, signaling left and right, and waving in circles to indicate when she should rev up the motor.  After Aida climbed into the wicker basket and wedged in her full skirt, he tied a rip cord to her wrist telling her that if she flew too high and was frightened, she could let out some of the air and, if she were to faint, the cord would release the air from the gas bag and she would come down to earth.  

            He needn’t have worried. Aida flew the Runabout perfectly across Paris and through the countryside.   Alberto Santos-Dumont actually guided her into a landing  on the polo field, briefly interrupting the game and causing considerable excitement.  She loved the trip, remarking, “I stopped the petrol motor and came down like a feather.  I’ve never had so much fun in my life.”  

            Alberto greeted her, "Mademoiselle, vous êtes la première aero-chauffeuse du monde!" ("Miss, you are the first woman aero-driver in the world!")  After the game, ignoring objections from the crowds and warnings from friends, Aida flew back to Paris. 

            Aida had interrupted an important polo match and the press gathered there were both fascinated and outraged that a woman should be driving this aero-machine.  Her parents were not pleased, to say the least.   They firmly believed that a respectable woman should appear in the newspapers only three times -- when she was born, married and when she died. They threatened to ruin Santos-Dumont if he leaked her name to the press and to disinherit her if she continued flying.  Accordingly, Santos-Dumont in his memoirs described her as “the heroine, a young and very pretty Cuban,  prominent in New York Society.” 

            Aida stopped flying, but never stopped being fascinated by the men who flew.  In the late 1920’s, she became friends with Charles Lindbergh and ended up marrying his lawyer, Charles Breckenridge.  But even he didn’t know about her adventure.   The story only came to light in 1932 when the couple was hosting a dinner party and a young Naval officer started to talk about the possibilities of lighter-than-air flying vehicles. Aida astonished the guests when she remarked, “ I’ve flown dirigibles myself; they are a lot of fun!”   Her story was published in Sportsman Pilot in 1933.

Postscript:

            Aida de Acosta was the only person Alberto Santos-Dumont ever permitted to fly any of his aircraft.   After the flight, Aida returned to New York City.  She married and divorced twice.  Later in life, after losing the sight in one of her eyes to glaucoma,  she founded and became director of the first eye bank in America.

            Alberto never married and kept a picture of Aida on his desk next to a vase of flowers all his life -- but there is no indication that they ever spoke or wrote again.   On November 12, 1906, he made the world’s first public airplane flight (the Wright Brothers had flown in secret, fearing they’d lose their patent designs).  He flew for twenty seconds --  the first pilot to lift off and land a completely self-propelled airplane.  Accordingly, some people consider Santos-Dumont the real “father of flight” since the Wright Brothers’ plane required high winds and a rail system to launch. 

            One final piece of trivia: In 1904, after Alberto complained that he couldn’t pull out his pocket watch to check his flying time while steering, his friend Louis Cartier created the one of the world’s first wristwatches so that the flyer could keep track of his flying time.  Cartier still sells “Santos-Dumont” models to this day.

For more information, see Paul Hoffman’s Wings of Madness: Alberto Santos-Dumont and the Invention of Flight (2003) pp 212–217 and this article: Eugene Register-Guard Aug. 12, 1953..  For a very entertaining look at Alberto Santos-Dumont and his eccentric ways and flying machines (though lacking any mention of Aida’s flight), check out Victoria’s  Griffith’s picture book biography: The Fabulous Flying Machines of Alberto Santos-Dumont (2011).

Carol Simon Levin is a librarian at the Somerset County Library and a member of the New Jersey Storyteller’s Network. She impersonates forgotten women in presentations at libraries, senior centers, and other venues.   For further information, write her at cslevin59@gmail.com.  For more information about early female aviators, go to  http://nobodyownsthesky.wordpress.com/

Check out more articles by Carol Simon Levin on the Girls Succeed blog:

Bridge builder, Emily Roebling

Aviator Elinor Smith 

Trailblazer: Aviator, Elinor Smith

      

Fearless Flyer: Elinor Smith's Daring Dive Under the Bridges of New York
by Carol Simon Levin

Elinor Smith
Photo from AvStop.com

     Elinor Smith got her first taste of flying when she was just six years old.  A French pilot was advertising flights above a potato field on Long Island and she begged her father to go up for a ride.  From the first moment in the air, she was hooked.  She started taking flying lessons at age ten, soloed and set a world light plane altitude record at age fifteen, and got her pilot's license at sixteen  -- becoming the youngest licensed pilot, male or female, in the United States.   Her license was signed by Orville Wright.

     But the press and other pilots doubted her abilities.  Newspapers called her the "Flying Flapper." A stunt pilot who had crashed his own plane bet "that kid with freckles who they let fly around every day" couldn't fly under a New York City East River bridge... she replied she'd fly under all four!

     No one had ever done that before -- for good reason.  It was dangerous – gusts of winds could hurl a small plane into  bridge pillars.  It was also illegal – Elinor could lose her newly acquired pilot’s license.  But Elinor carefully inspected the route,  studying the tides,  the construction of the bridges, and calculating speed, distance & weight.  She joked, "I hung by my heels from all those bridges."  She also practiced weaving between sailboats on Long Island Sound.

    On a bright  Sunday Oct. 21, 1928, as she prepared to take off in her father’s Waco 9 airplane, she felt a tap on her cockpit. Charles Lindbergh grinned at her, “Good luck, kid, keep your nose down in the turns.”

     Despite her preparation, she encountered surprises -- wooden blocks dangling below Queensboro bridge deck forced her to fly just above the water's surface.  She glided uneventfully under Williamsburg Bridge, then dipped under the Manhattan Bridge, where she saw a huge crowd of spectators and newsreel reporters  (so the government would have proof  of her illegal flight).

     Finally all that was left was the Brooklyn Bridge – but as she flew under the bridge, she saw that both a tanker and a navy destroyer  were heading right toward her!  Elinor tipped her plane on its side and just managed to squeeze through! 

     Heady with success, Elinor circled the Statue of Liberty before landing in Roosevelt Field to cheers from family and friends. She had succeeded -- but what about her  license?

     Eight days later,  New York City Mayor Jimmy Walker summoned  Elinor to his office. He announced, "You're suspended....” but continued,  “from flying for ten days, retroactive to the day of your flight."   The Department of Commerce also sent her a letter demanding that she stop flying under bridges – but included a note asking for autograph!

     Elinor continued flying and setting speed, altitude, and duration records.  At age nineteen, she was voted the "best female pilot of the year" (besting Amelia Earhart) -- but her own dream of flying solo across the Atlantic was thwarted when the Depression forced her airplane sponsor to pull out. 

     When Elinor was eighty-nine years old, she was invited to fly NASA’s Challenger simulator at the Ames Research Center.  She remarked “It’s a spectacular ride. Everything about it is thrilling, but perhaps the most gratifying is that the entire support crew was made up of females. My instructor, the operator and the assistant were all women.”

For more information:

The Amazing Aviatrix Elinor Smith http://womanpilot.com/?p=49 (article from the online magazine "Woman Pilot.")

Soar Elinor Soar! by Tami Lewis Brown (inspirational picture book biography, includes interview quotes with Elinor in the back matter.)

Aviatrix by Elinor Smith (her autobiography written in 1981)

Additional sources listed in her wikipedia article:   http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elinor_Smith

A bibliography of other pioneering female aviators can be found at: http://nobodyownsthesky.wordpress.com/bibliography/

Telling Herstories: Fascinating Women History Forgot by Carol Simon Levin

© Carol Simon Levin 2014  www.tellingherstories.wordpress.com

About Carol Simon Levin:

Carol Simon Levin is a librarian at the Somerset County Library and a member of the New Jersey Storyteller’s Network. She impersonates Elinor Smith and other forgotten women in presentations at libraries, senior centers, and other venues.   For more information, visit http://nobodyownsthesky.wordpress.com/ and http://tellingherstories.wordpress.com/

Trailblazer: Bridge Builder Emily Warren Roebling by Carol Simon Levin

 Thank you to Carol Simon Levin for sharing this article about Emily Warren Roebling.

Bridge Builder in Petticoats: Emily Warren Roebling and the Brooklyn Bridge

On December 12, 1881, people in New York City would have witnessed a strange sight.  High above the East River, men in business suits were walking cautiously along a narrow path of wooden boards laid across the steel frame of a huge bridge.  Strangest of all, the line was led by a woman, her long skirt billowing as she showed them details of the construction.  When they reached the New York side, everyone toasted her with champagne.  It was the first official crossing of the Brooklyn Bridge.

In 1881, women could not vote in most state and federal elections.  Their minds and bodies were considered weak and fragile. Very few colleges accepted female students and, though poor women worked, it was unthinkable for respectable middle and upper-class women to do so.  They most certainly would not be helping to supervise the greatest construction project of the age.   

But Emily Warren Roebling was doing just that.  

After her husband Washington Roebling, the Chief Engineer of the bridge, became an invalid from injuries received on the project, Emily became his eyes and ears, feet and hands and voice.  She started out carrying his orders back and forth to the site. When he became unable to read or write, she read aloud all written material to him and wrote his responses. Since Washington could not talk to anyone but Emily without becoming exhausted, he began discussing all the details of the bridge with her, expecting that she would explain these to the assistant engineers.  As a result, although she never went to an engineering university, Emily gradually learned quite a lot about bridge engineering. 

For nearly eleven years, the bridge company kept her work a secret. (They worried that the public would lose confidence in the safety of the project if they knew a woman was involved.)  Her role was finally revealed on May 24, 1883 at the opening ceremonies when Congressman Abram S. Hewitt honored her work in a speech. 

Later that day, The Brooklyn Eagle publicly praised Emily in its article on the opening of the bridge:

Great emergencies are the opportunities of great minds.  Mrs. Emily Roebling met this difficulty as nobody else could.  She addressed her remarkable intelligence to the acquisition of the higher mathematics...  She mastered this most bewildering of sciences, applied it to the bridge, was in rapport with her husband, and dazzled and astounded the engineers by her complete and intelligent conception of their chief’s theories and plans…Day after day, when she could be spared from the sickroom, in cold and in wet, the devoted wife exchanged the duties of chief nurse for those of chief engineer of the bridge, explaining knotty points, examining results for herself, and thus she established the most perfect means of communication between the structure and its author.  How well she discharged this self-imposed duty the grand and beautiful causeway best tells.

Emily did not rest on her accomplishments. After the bridge, she helped design the family mansion in Trenton, studied law, attended the coronation of the Tsar of Russia and even took tea with Queen Victoria.  At the time of her death, she was called “one of the most distinguished women in the country” and “the most famous woman in New Jersey” – yet today most people don’t even know her name!

If you walk across the bridge, be sure look  at the bronze plaque on the East Tower.  It states:

The Builders of the Bridge
Dedicated to the Memory of

Emily Warren Roebling

1843-1903

whose faith and courage helped her stricken husband

Col. Washington A. Roebling, C.E.

1837-1926

complete the construction of this bridge

from the plans of his father

John A. Roebling, C.E.

1806-1869

who gave his life to the bridge

“BACK OF EVERY GREAT WORK WE CAN FIND THE SELF-SACRIFICING DEVOTION OF A WOMAN.”

Carol Simon Levin is a librarian at the Somerset County Library and a member of the New Jersey Storyteller’s Network. She impersonates Emily and other forgotten women in presentations available for libraries, senior centers, historical societies and other venues.   Programs are accompanied by a "lantern slide show" (PowerPoint) with photographs and lithographs.  They can be tailored for adult or youth audiences. For further information, write her at cslevin59 (at) gmail (dot) com.  For more information about Emily Roebling, check out www.bridgebuilderinpetticoats.com.