Sunday, March 31, 2013

MONTGOMERY COUNTY FIRST LADIES

In 1979 RITA C. BANNING was the first women to be elected to the Montgomery County Board of Commissioners.  In the 1983 election BANNING won re-election.  In 1986, BETTY LINKER was appointed to replace Commissioner Allan C. Myers, who had died while in office, which meant that two women were on the board. 

 

Four years later both Banning and Linker were returned to office. Linker died in 1989 and another woman, Floriana Bloss, was appointed, meaning that there were again two women on the board.

Nearly ten years after Rita Banning and Floriana Bloss left office RUTH DAMSKER joined the county board in 1999, and was reelected twice.  She served until 2008. 

 

LESLIE RICHARDS is the current female Montgomery County Commissioner.   

 

QUIZ: Who was the first female elected as Montgomery County Controller? 

 

Today’s Answer: DIANE MORGAN was the first female elected as County Controller in 2007.   

 

Source:  http://aboveavgjane.blogspot.com/2011/03/women-on-montgomery-county-board-of.html                

Saturday, March 30, 2013

DESIGNERS

LIZ CLAIBORNE studied art in Europe rather than finish high school. She worked as a designer in New York for 25 years before founding her own firm in 1976. The company began designing stylish sportswear for working women, ultimately commanding a billion dollars a year.

 

DONNA KARAN started to design clothes as a teenager and studied at New York's Parsons School of Design.  Karan launched her first collection under her own name in 1985 and five years later added a ready-to-wear line, DKNY.  In 1991 she initiated a menswear line, soon adding children's clothing, perfume, cosmetics, hosiery, and other products to her design empire.
WHO SAID, “Fashion is not something that exists in dresses only.  Fashion is in the sky, in the street; fashion has to do with ideas, the way we live, what is happening.”

 

ANSWER:   COCO CHANEL

 

Source: www.infoplease.com                www.brainyquote.com

 

Friday, March 29, 2013

GREAT QUEENS

“We are not interested in the possibilities of defeat. They do not exist.”

QUEEN VICTORIA the United Kingdom (1837-1901), & Ireland (1819-1901)

 

CLEOPATRA was the last Pharaoh of Egypt, and the last of the Ptolemy dynasty of Egyptian rulers.  As she tried to keep power for her dynasty, she made famous connections with Roman rulers Julius Caesar and Marc Antony.

 

ISABELLA ruled Castile and Aragon jointly with her husband, Ferdinand. She's famous for supporting Columbus' voyage; she's also credited for her patronage of arts and education, instituting the Inquisition in Spain, and insisting that the Native Americans be treated as persons.

 

During her reign, CATHERINE II of Russia modernized and westernized Russia, promoted education, and expanded Russia's borders.

 

QUIZ: What was the name of the queen who ruled Egypt (1372-1350 B.C.) and also was the aunt of King Tut?

ANSWER:   QUEEN NEFERTITI 

 

 Sources:  http://thinkexist.com/quotes      http://womenshistory.about.com   

 

 



Thursday, March 28, 2013

AUTHORS

Beginning with The Children’s Hour in 1934, LILLIAN HELLMAN’s award-winning plays presented powerful and bitter pictures of intolerance and exploitation. One of many Hollywood screenwriters who refused to testify before the House Un-American Activities Committee when asked about the politics of her friends and associates, Hellman was blacklisted from 1948 to the ‘60s. Her book, An Unfinished Woman, won a National Book Award in 1969.

 

JOANNA MACY has created a ground-breaking theoretical framework for personal and social change. She has written many books and led workshops for thousands of people around the world. Her “Work that Reconnects” brings a new way of seeing the world, helping to transform despair and apathy, in the face of overwhelming social and ecological crises, into constructive, collaborative action.

QUIZ: Who was the Native North American woman guide on the Lewis and Clark expedition?

ANSWER:   SACAJAWEA

 

Source: www.NWHP.org           

 

Wednesday, March 27, 2013

WOMEN ASTRONAUTS

On June 16, 1963 Russian Cosmonaut, VALENTINA TERESHKOVA, became the very first female to fly in space.  It was almost 20 years before the second Russian woman ventured into space.  SVETLANA SAVITSKAYA was the first woman to walk in space (July 25, 1984) while on an expedition to the Salyut 7 space station, and the first woman to make two spaceflights. 

 

SALLY RIDE was the first American female astronaut to fly into space (Jun. 18, 1983 and Oct. 5, 1984).  JUDITH RESNIK was the first Jewish-American in space. Reskin died on her second flight, in the Jan. 28, 1986 Challenger disaster, along with CHRISTA MCAULIFFE.

 

KATHRYN D. SULLIVAN was the first American woman to walk in space (Oct. 11, 1984).   There have been 56 women astronauts, 44 of them were from the United States.

 

QUIZ: Who was the First African-American woman in space?

ANSWER: MAE JEMISON

 

Source:  wikipedia.org     

Tuesday, March 26, 2013

ENVIRONMENTALLY FRIENDLY CEOs

GILLIAN CHRISTIE is

President and Owner of Christie Communications in California.  As CEO of Christie Communications, a full-service, organic marketing company exclusively helping ethical businesses, socially conscious organizations and charities broaden their impact through effective communication services, Gillian Christie has been helping organizations make peace profitable. The agency’s non-profit arm, Christie CommUnity Foundation, helps businesses partner with developing nations to facilitate growth, health and economic prosperity in communities such as Sudan, Sri Lanka and Rwanda.

 

TANYA NARATH is the Executive Director and CEO of the Leadership Institute for Ecology and the Economy. Under her collaborative and inspiring leadership, the Institute’s Leadership Training for a Sustainable Future program has developed a network of over 250 powerful leaders who are creating public policy that is environmentally friendly and socially equitable for a healthy economy and a sustainable community.

 

QUIZ: Who wrote the sonnet “The New Colossus” which is inscribed on the base of the Stature of Liberty?   

ANSWER:   Emma Lazarus

 

Source NWHP.org

 

Monday, March 25, 2013

WOMAN RULER

GOLDA MEIR (1898 – 1978) was an Israeli teacher and politician who became the fourth Prime Minister of Israel.  Meir was elected Prime Minister of Israel on March 17, 1969, after serving as Minister of Labour and Foreign Minister. Israel's first and the world's third woman to hold such an office, she was described as the "Iron Lady" of Israeli politics. Former Prime Minister David Ben-Gurion used to call Meir "the best man in the government"; she was often portrayed as the "strong-willed, straight-talking, grey-bunned grandmother of the Jewish people".  In 1974, after the end of the Yom Kippur War, Meir resigned as prime minister. She died in 1978 of leukemia.

 

 On March 25, 1911, a fire broke out at a New York City sweatshop, located on the top three floors of the ten-story Asch Building in Manhattan.  146 of the more than 500 women, some as young as 12 years, either perished in the fire or jumped to their deaths that day. 
QUIZ: What was the name of the company for which they worked?

ANSWER:  TRIANGLE SHIRTWAIST COMPANY

 

Source NWHP.org