Careers for Women: When It’s Your Turn To Speak Out

WHEN IT’S YOUR TURN TO SPEAK OUT

by David W. King

Originally published in the Los Angeles Herald Examiner, December 13, 1979

They marched in small rows in my grandmother’s day. And for short distances. Her name was Marie Louise Arthur: “Molly” to her husband; “Mama” to her children. My generation never met her, my mother’s mother, but we all knew of her.

We were proudly shown the reprint from the newspaper, with the photograph of her ten children pyramided in front of her: one of them my mother, the uncles and aunts. The story was almost too faded to read, but it was fun to see what Aunt Gladys looked like at age 22, and Uncle Dave – the baby – at age three. And all the others in between, except for Uncle Eddie, who hadn’t been born yet. The story was framed and proudly hung on a wall in our living room. She even made the cover.

“The New York World Magazine and Story Section” was dated August 16, 1914, and a crowd of fifty marchers must have been a pretty big deal in those days – in the days before a demonstration was a demonstration. I imagined all 50 to be just like grandmother: big-bosomed, dresses to the ankles, and all with hair piled on top of their heads like dark brown popovers.