Linda Lingle

Linda Lingle ("née" Cutter; June 4, 1953) is an American politician, who was the sixth governor of Hawaii from 2002 until 2010. She was the first Republican governor of Hawaii since 1962. Lingle was also the state's first female and first Jewish governor. Prior to serving as governor, Lingle served as Maui County mayor, council member, and chair of the Hawaii Republican Party.
During the 2004 Republican National Convention in New York City, Lingle served as chair of the convention during the absence of permanent chair Dennis Hastert from the convention floor. In 2012, she was the Republican nominee for the United States Senate, vying unsuccessfully for an open seat vacated by retiring U.S. Senator Daniel Akaka.
In January 2015, Lingle was appointed as a senior adviser to Illinois Governor Bruce Rauner, and left the position in July 2016. She also served on the Governors’ Council of the Bipartisan Policy Center in Washington, D.C. Lingle moved back to Hawaii in the second quarter of 2017 and became a member of Hawaii Pacific University's board of trustees in June 2017.
Early life, education, and early career.
Lingle was born Linda Cutter to a Jewish family in St. Louis, Missouri in 1953, the daughter of Mildred and Richard Cutter. Lingle moved with her parents to Southern California when she was 12. She graduated from Birmingham High School in Lake Balboa, California (at that time, part of Van Nuys), then received her bachelor's degree in journalism "cum laude" from California State University, Northridge, in 1975.
Soon after that, she followed her father to Hawaii, working first in Honolulu as a public information officer for the Teamsters and Hotel Workers Union. Later, she moved to Molokai, where she started the "Molokai Free Press", a community newspaper.
County politics.
In 1980, Lingle was elected to the Maui County Council, where she served five two-year terms. Lingle served three of those terms representing Molokai and two terms as an at-large member. Upon the 1990 retirement of Hannibal Tavares as mayor of Maui County, Lingle decided to challenge former Maui mayor and Hawai'i State Speaker of the House of Representatives Elmer Cravalho for the seat. Despite polls showing Lingle trailing far behind her Democratic opponent, Lingle proved victorious. The "Honolulu Advertiser" and "Honolulu Star-Bulletin" newspapers declared the election one of the biggest upsets in Hawai'i political history. She became the youngest person elected to the office of Maui County Mayor, at the age of 37, as well as the first woman. She was sworn into office as Mayor of Maui on January 2, 1991. In 1994, Lingle easily won re-election over her Democratic opponent, Maui County councilman Goro Hokama.
Under Lingle's leadership, Maui County implemented performance-based budgeting. Its successful passage and execution earned for Lingle the "Distinguished Budget Presentation Award" from the Government Finance Officers Association for four years. Mayor Lingle was also credited for attracting tourism and job growth to Maui County during a period when the state tourism industry was struggling.
1998 gubernatorial campaign.
Lingle would once again attempt an upset victory, this time in pursuit of the governor's office in 1998. Barred from seeking a third term as mayor of Maui, Lingle was nominated by the Hawaii Republican Party to run against incumbent Governor Benjamin J. Cayetano. Republican party members believed that Lingle was the best shot at the office and that 1998 would probably be the only chance the party would have of ever winning. Lingle capitalized on the anger of Hawaii residents over the stagnant economy and their dissatisfaction with the strategies employed by the Democrats in attempt to solve the problem. Cayetano trailed in the media polls heading into the November election but on the evening of the election, Cayetano and Lingle were separated by a single percentage point forcing a recount. Lingle was defeated in the closest election in Hawaii history.
The state Democratic Party was accused of launching a whisper campaign alleging that Lingle was a lesbian, and that she would abolish Christmas as a state holiday. Previously, Governor Cayetano had given state workers all of Christmas Eve day off, and other local government leaders followed suit – except then-Maui County Mayor Lingle, who said it would be too costly.
State party chair.
After being defeated, Lingle was elected chair of the Hawaii Republican Party. She served from 1999 to 2002. During her tenure as party chair, Lingle overhauled party policies and gave the party a lift she believed was needed to make the party competitive in a historically Democratic Party-dominated state. Internal reforms proved successful and Lingle succeeded in electing more Republicans to seats in both houses of the Hawaii State Legislature. At the peak of Republican success, the party held 19 of the 51 seats in the state House of Representatives. Party membership grew as younger people joined. Republicans gained a more youthful appearance and had reinvented itself informally as the new GOP Hawaii. Lingle is a member of The Wish List, America's largest fundraising and campaign political action committee for Pro-choice Republican Women and The Republican Majority for Choice.
Governor of Hawaii.
2002 gubernatorial campaign.
Barred from seeking a third term, Cayetano announced his retirement from political service in 2002. Having become even more popular among Hawaii residents, Lingle was once again selected as the Republican nominee for the office of Governor of Hawaii. Her campaign was substantially aided when the popular favorite, Democratic Mayor of the City and County of Honolulu Jeremy Harris withdrew after allegations of campaign finance irregularities. Hawaii Democrats then nominated incumbent Lieutenant Governor Mazie Hirono; it was one of the few gubernatorial races in which both major candidates were women.
Lingle ran on her "Agenda for New Beginnings," a campaign platform developed to promote Republican leadership and highlight their criticisms of the previous 40 years of Democratic administration of the state. It also cited differences between Lingle's message and the previous, more conservative platforms which Hawaii Republicans had advocated.
Focusing less on her mayoral accomplishments and more on the message of reform, Lingle won the election alongside former state judge Duke Aiona, who became Lingle's lieutenant governor.
Lingle was the first state Governor-elect not to be inaugurated at the Coronation Pavilion on the grounds of Iolani Palace. She was inaugurated in the rotunda of the Hawaii State Capitol. She took the oath of office upon a Tanakh.
First term.
Lingle signed into law the Three Strikes Law and Sex Offender Registry Website Law. She vetoed a bill that would have required all hospitals in Hawaii to provide emergency contraception to rape victims, concerned that Catholic hospitals would challenge it. In May 2004 Lingle led a delegation to Israel, paid for by the Israeli Government. She enjoyed high approval ratings, usually around 70 percent.
Lingle spent much of 2004 campaigning for Republican candidates, both in the Presidential election and the Hawaii state legislature. She supported President George W. Bush's Iraq policies, and campaigned for Bush in the contiguous United States. When some polling late in the election showed Bush tied or narrowly leading Democrat John Kerry, Lingle attempted to help Republicans carry her state for the first time since 1984. Vice President Dick Cheney also campaigned in the state. The state legislature had a Democratic supermajority and she wanted to have enough members to block them from overriding her vetoes. Ultimately, not only did Kerry win the state, but Republicans lost five seats in the state legislature, reducing their presence to near single-digits and causing the Democrats to consider Lingle more vulnerable than they initially expected. The 2004 presidential election in Hawaii was the closest Republicans have come to reclaiming the state since 1984, when Ronald Reagan last won the state.
In January 2006, Lingle received an honorary doctorate degree in public management from the University of the City of Manila, presented by Manila mayor Lito Atienza while Lingle was on an official visit to the Philippines.
In education, she attempted to divide the State Board of Education into seven local school boards, but failed. One of the more controversial issues Lingle championed is the practice of sending prisoners to the mainland, as opposed to building a new prison in Hawaii.
2006 gubernatorial election.
In 2006, Lingle announced her candidacy for re-election as Governor of Hawaii. In the Democratic Party, many people were speculated to run, but many of them declined, including State Senator Colleen Hanabusa, then Senate President Bobby Bunda, former Congressman Ed Case (who ran for U.S. Senate), U.S. Congressman Neil Abercrombie, and Hawaii County Mayor Harry Kim. Despite the difficulty of finding an opponent for Lingle, former State Senator Randy Iwase decided to run for Governor. In the primary election he easily defeated Waianae Harbormaster William Aila Jr., and ended up with former Big Island State Senator Malama Solomon as his running mate. Over the course of the campaign, Iwase was considered an underdog who had only spent $340,000, compared to Lingle's $6 million; in his ads, he attacked Lingle over her relationship with President Bush. Governor Lingle won by the largest margin in state history, 63 percent to 35 percent.
Second term.
In August 2007, the Hawaii Supreme Court invalidated a Lingle appointee's exemption of the Hawaii Superferry from having to undertake an environmental assessment before operating in Hawaii waters. The Superferry was an $80 million high-speed ferry. Despite the Court's ruling, the ferry sailed to Kauai without an environmental assessment. It was met by protesters on surfboards who turned the ferry back to Oahu. Lingle summoned a massive police and Coast Guard response. She told Kauai protesters that they would be charged under Hawaii's anti-terrorism laws if they continued to interfere with the Superferry's operation. Lingle sought a legislative exemption from environmental law on behalf of the Superferry (known as Act Two). Several Maui groups, including the Sierra Club, Maui Tomorrow and the Kahului Harbor Coalition challenged the law as unconstitutional, citing a violation of separation of powers, and favoritism towards a single company. The ferry suspended all Hawaii service in March 2009, days after the Hawaii Supreme Court struck down Act Two as unconstitutional.
As she had four years before, Lingle campaigned for the Republican ticket, describing herself as "of the same breed as McCain and Palin." She received national exposure when she delivered a primetime address on the third night of the 2008 Republican National Convention praising John McCain's choice of Alaska Governor Sarah Palin as his vice-presidential running-mate. Lingle and Palin, both Republican women governors of non-contiguous states, are friends who grew acquainted through the Republican Governors Association. Lingle's speech filled the role of the traditional address formally nominating the vice-presidential candidate, though Palin was not officially nominated until the next night.
In July 2009, the Lingle Administration ended the Hawaii Immigrant Health Initiative, a state program providing medical coverage for legal immigrants present in the United States for fewer than five years. This move included the elimination of all residents present in Hawaii under the Compact of Free Association from QUEST, the state's Medicaid coverage plan that assists the low income population in Hawaii with their health care needs. Noting that such a policy likely constituted unlawful discrimination in violation of the Equal Protection Clause, federal district court judge John Michael Seabright issued a preliminary injunction against the implementation of the substituted health care plan. Subsequent Governor Neil Abercrombie indicated that he may continue the State's appeal of the injunction to the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit.
On April 13, 2010, two student protesters who were occupying her office were arrested and criminal trespassing citations were issued to eight others. The demonstrators were part of a sit-in to protest a school furlough policy implemented due to budget shortages. The following day, April 14, two more protesters were arrested and citations were issued to five other protesters.
Lingle on July 6, 2010 vetoed Hawaii House Bill 444, which would have allowed for civil unions for couples in Hawaii, arguing the issue should be decided by referendum. The bill had passed the State House with three votes less than the two-thirds vote threshold necessary to override the veto, although the bill met that threshold in the State Senate.
2012 U.S. Senate election.
In October 2011, Lingle said on KSSK radio show that she would run for the open seat vacated by retiring U.S. Senator Daniel Akaka (D-HI). She won the Republican primary election on August 11, 2012 against nominal opposition and faced Hirono in the general election – a repeat of the 2002 gubernatorial race.
Lingle was the first reasonably well-funded Republican to run for the Senate in Hawaii since Pat Saiki ran in the 1990 special election against Akaka, and the strongest Republican candidate for a full term in the Senate from the state in memory. Although a poll in the summer of 2012 showed the race as close as five points, ultimately Hirono defeated Lingle with 63 percent of the vote to Lingle's 37 percent.
After 2012.
After her failed Senate bid, Lingle taught a public policy seminar at California State University, Northridge, from which she had graduated in 1975. She also gave lectures and worked with the Governor's Council and Energy Security Council for the Bipartisan Policy Center.
In January 2015, Lingle was appointed as a senior adviser to Illinois Governor Bruce Rauner. She was to join a trio of outsiders in May/June 2015 to work on problems such as the state's retirement system and low credit ratings. Lingle left the chief operating officer position in July 2016. Weeks later, she delivered an opening-day speech at the 2016 Republican National Convention about Jewish support for the party and for Donald Trump as its presidential nominee.
In January 2017, Lingle announced at a Republican gathering that she planned to move back to Hawaii in April 2017. In May 2017, she was one of four former governors brought together by Harvard University to discuss issues related to the nation's opioid crisis. Lingle became a member of Hawaii Pacific University's board of trustees in June 2017.
In December 2018, Lingle was the last speaker in a year-long Leadership Series for the Nisei Veterans Memorial Center. In her comments, Lingle described her leadership path and said that people aren't born leaders, but become them through handling failures and taking advantage of opportunities for success when others do not.
Lingle supported 2020 candidate Rick Blangiardi, who won election to become mayor of Honolulu in January 2021.
Personal life.
Lingle was married and divorced twice. She married her first husband, Charles Lingle, while in college, in 1972. Upon leaving California for Hawaii, she divorced him in 1975 but kept the Lingle name. During her term as mayor of Maui County, Lingle divorced her second husband, Maui attorney William Crockett, to whom she was married from 1986 to 1997. Lingle is currently single and does not have any children.
Her uncle founded the Cutter Ford car dealerships in Hawaii.
Lingle is a California State University, Northridge 2004 distinguished alumni honoree.
Lingle is active in the Republican Jewish Coalition, serving as a speaker at events and otherwise using her role as the only Jewish Republican US governor. President George W. Bush appointed her to serve on the Honorary Delegation to accompany him to Jerusalem for the celebration of the 60th anniversary of the State of Israel in May 2008.


Sarah Kirnon

Sarah Kirnon is a West Indian chef. Kirnon owned and operated Miss Ollie's, an Afro-Caribbean restaurant in Oakland, California, from 2012 until 2019, when she announced she would close the restaurant to reopen the space as a non-profit incubator for Black chefs, artists, musicians and other creators.
Early life and education.
Sarah Kirnon was born in the 1960s in Leicestershire, England. Her mother is Barbadian and her father, Antiguan. She identifies as West Indian. At the age of four, her parents sent her to Gall Hill, Saint John, Barbados to live with her maternal grandmother and great-grandmother. Kirnon credits her time in Barbados with instilling a love for food. Her grandmother and uncles raised produce and animals on their farm, using the ingredients in daily cooking. At age thirteen, she moved back to England.
In 1999, Kirnon moved to San Francisco.
Career.
After relocating to San Francisco, Kirnon was chef at Emmy's Spaghetti Shack, followed by Front Porch. Eventually, she moved to Oakland to serve as chef at Hibiscus, where she created contemporary Caribbean food. In January 2012, she left Hibiscus, announcing that she would open a restaurant in downtown Oakland named Miss Ollie's, named after her grandmother who died in 2011.
In December 2012, Miss Ollie's opened in Swan's Marketplace in Oakland. The restaurant specialized in Caribbean cuisine. Menu items included many favorites from her childhood, such as fried chicken, saltfish and ackee, and goat curry. In 2016, Kirnon and Miss Ollie's were featured in the documentary "Hungry". Miss Ollie's was named one of the top 100 restaurants in the San Francisco Bay Area in 2018 and 2019 by the "San Francisco Chronicle".
Kirnon was chef-in-residence at Elda in San Francisco from September until November 2020. She served Caribbean take out meals, including dishes found at Miss Ollie's. During this time Kirnon started to re-examine the concept of the brick and mortar restaurant because of the impact the COVID-19 pandemic had on the restaurant industry. She believed that pop-ups and smaller establishments, with lower overhead and smaller staffs, would be more common after the pandemic. Weeks after the residency ended, Kirnon announced she would close Miss Ollie's at the end of the year to reopen the space as Sanctuary, a non-profit business incubator for Black chefs, musicians, artists and other creatives.


Ruth Smeeth

Ruth Lauren Smeeth ("née" Anderson; born 29 June 1979) is a former British Labour Party politician who was the Member of Parliament (MP) for Stoke-on-Trent North from 2015 until 2019.
Early life.
Smeeth was born in Edinburgh, Scotland. Her mother is from east London, and her father is a Scottish trade unionist. Her maternal family is Jewish, and arrived in London during the 1890s, having escaped Russian pogroms. However, she had no contact with her father after her parents divorced when she was aged three. Smeeth attended school and taught at a Jewish school in Bristol, where her mother was later deputy general secretary for Amicus, and in her early life travelled extensively across the UK due to her mother's work.
Smeeth graduated with a degree in Politics and International Relations from the University of Birmingham in 2000. She worked as a policy and research officer for a trade union before working in a public relations role from January 2004 to September 2005 at Sodexo. She then became director of public affairs and campaigns at the Britain Israel Communications and Research Centre (BICOM) in November 2005. She later worked in PR for Nestlé. From 2010 to 2015, she was a deputy director of anti-racist organisation, Hope not Hate. She has also been employed by the Community Security Trust and has worked for the Board of Deputies of British Jews.
Parliamentary career.
Smeeth was selected as Labour Party candidate for the Burton constituency in the 2010 general election, finishing 6,304 votes behind Andrew Griffiths of the Conservative Party. She was then selected from an all-women shortlist to be Labour Party candidate for Stoke-on-Trent North, following the retirement of incumbent Labour MP Joan Walley, and was subsequently elected at the 2015 general election.
Smeeth backed Yvette Cooper in the 2015 Labour Leadership Election
In October 2015, Smeeth was given an adjournment debate on holiday hunger.
In June 2016, Smeeth resigned her post as Parliamentary Private Secretary (PPS) to the shadow Northern Ireland and Scotland teams, alongside others, in protest at Jeremy Corbyn's leadership. She supported Owen Smith in the failed attempt to replace him in the 2016 Labour Party (UK) leadership election.
In June 2016, Smeeth campaigned for the UK to remain in the European Union. Her constituency voted for Brexit by 72.1%. In November 2016, Smeeth said "I’ll be voting for us to move to Article 50. The general public, especially in Stoke-on-Trent, sent a very clear message with some parts of my constituency voting 80/20 to leave. My whole priority and focus is how we can make it work".
In June 2016, at the launch of the Chakrabarti Report, Marc Wadsworth, a Labour Party activist, described Smeeth as working "hand-in-hand" with Kate McCann of "The Daily Telegraph", after Smeeth passed her his press release. Smeeth said that Wadsworth was using "traditional antisemitic slurs to attack me for being part of a 'media conspiracy'" and criticised a lack of response from Corbyn or his office, calling on him to resign however, the incident was caught on video and Wadsworth didn't mention a general “media conspiracy”, or anything about Jews. Wadsworth said he was unaware Smeeth was Jewish and that "I’ve never been called anti-semitic in my life...The Jewish people have an ally in me.” Smeeth said that she received 25,000 pieces of abuse during July and August, including 20,000 in the 12-hour period immediately following the incident. However, the Jewish Voice for Labour group contested this by comparing Smeeth's claim with a study by the Community Service Trust who monitor anti-Semitic and abusive media content. The study found that over an entire year (encompassing the 12 hour period of Smeeth's claim of 20,000 cases) only 9,008 original Tweets concerning Jews were classified as antagonistic. Other studies investigating the most abused MPs on Twitter found that Smeeth wasn't mentioned since she didn't exceed the threshold of abuse to be ranked.
The police strengthened her security after she received a death threat. In April 2018, Smeeth was accompanied by around 40 Labour MPs and peers to a Labour hearing into Wadsworth's conduct. Wadsworth was expelled for bringing the Party into disrepute.
She retained her seat in the 2017 general election with a much reduced majority.
In March 2019, Smeeth resigned as PPS to Tom Watson, Deputy Leader of the Labour Party to vote against a second referendum on Brexit, as Labour had instructed its MPs to abstain.
In April 2019, Smeeth was elected Parliamentary Chair of the Jewish Labour Movement. She is a member of Labour Friends of Israel.
In the December 2019 general election, Smeeth lost her seat to Conservative Jonathan Gullis, who overturned her 2,359, or five per cent, majority to a 15% or 6,286 majority of his own.
Smeeth endorsed Ian Murray in the 2020 Labour Party deputy leadership election.
Personal life.
Smeeth was married to Michael Smeeth, a business executive. She describes herself as 'culturally Jewish'. Since 2015, she has been a board member of Hope not Hate.
In June 2020, she became chief executive of Index on Censorship, an organisation which campaigns for freedom of speech.


Kary Osmond

Kary Lyndsey Osmond (born October 18, 1979 in Mississauga, Ontario) is a Canadian who hosted Canadian Broadcasting Corporation's daytime cooking show "Best Recipes Ever".
She grew up in a family that loved to cook and eat. Kary would help her mother in their family-owned Ukrainian deli. When they opened a catering company in their home's basement, Kary helped to roll meatballs, cut bread and wrap the veggie and fruit platters.
Kary's first official cooking class was in Grade seven where she conquered her first recipe – Spaghetti à la Carbonara – in her Home Economics class. She then started collecting cookbooks with her first being a gift from her mom (Just for Kids Cookbook).
When she was young, she skated competitively and enjoyed traveling, spending many summers visiting family in British Columbia, Canada.
Kary is said to have had some chef school training at The George Brown College Chef School, but length of study remains unknown. She may have studied food theory to better understand the "whys" of cooking but most of her culinary knowledge was gleaned from her family and tirelessly studying cookbooks. Then putting into practice what she had learned.
At 30, the CBC called her in to audition for their brand new show – Best Recipes Ever. As the inaugural host, Kary shared tips and tricks with viewers to help them gain confidence in the kitchen and teach novices how to cook.
Kary did not return to Best Recipe's Ever after season four. In March 2013, she contributed, along with dozens of others, to a back-to-basics campaign with the Ontario Produce Marketing Association called Produce Made Simple. The campaign taught people how to pick, store, and prepare produce and also featured original recipes developed by Kary along with many others.


Doris Crouse-Mays

Doris Crouse-Mays (born 1958) is an American labor leader.
A native of Rural Retreat, Virginia, Crouse-Mays began her career as a telephone operator; as a shop steward she soon because involved in the organized labor movement. She first joined the Communications Workers of America, and later did organizational work for the International Ladies' Garment Workers' Union. Thanks to her abilities in the role, she became the state field director for the national AFL-CIO in 1997, in which position she attracted new members and expanded the group's political reach. In 2001 she served as the group's statewide coordinator for political programs; two years later she became its political director. She is a member of the Steering and Central Committee of the Virginia Democratic Party, and she was elected to the Democratic National Committee in 2008; in 2013 she served on the transition committee for governor-elect Terry McAuliffe. She is a board member of Emerge Virginia, a group which looks for women to run for political office.
Crouse-May was the first woman to hold executive office in Virginia's AFL-CIO, being elected its secretary-treasurer for a four-year term beginning in 2006. In August 2010 she became the first woman to be elected its president; in 2014 she was reelected to another four-year term in the position. Crouse-Mays was named one of the Library of Virginia's Virginia Women in History for 2017.


Margaret Fenwick

Margaret Taylor Naysmith Fenwick (19 August 1919 – 8 February 1992), born Margaret Mands, was a Scottish trade unionist, who became the leader of her trade union.
Born in Dundee, Fenwick was educated at Stobswell School, leaving at the age of fourteen to undertake an apprenticeship as a weaver at the Scottish Co-operative Wholesale Society's Taybank Works. She followed in a family tradition of becoming an active trade unionist, joining the Dundee and District Union of Jute and Flax Workers, and within a year achieved success in campaigning for apprentices to be paid at the same rate regardless of age.
In about 1948, Fenwick was elected to the Management Committee of the union, and that year married Andrew Small Fenwick, a co-worker; the couple had four children. She tried to become a shop steward in 1950, but the company management refused to allow this, claiming that because she was married and had young children, she would be unable to fulfil the role to the same standard as a single person.
Fenwick continued her activity in the union, which was renamed as the Union of Jute, Flax and Kindred Textile Operatives. She was elected as Assistant General Secretary in 1960, then as General Secretary in 1971. she served on various government committees relating to the jute industry, and was made a Member of the Order of the British Empire in 1973.
In 1976, Fenwick served as chair of the General Federation of Trade Unions, the first woman to hold the post.
Fenwick announced her retirement in 1978. Her post was not filled, as the union merged into the National Union of Dyers, Bleachers and Textile Workers the following May. In retirement, she focused on her role as a magistrate, and also served on industrial tribunals.


Hodierna of St Albans

Hodierna of St Albans (fl. 1150–1210) was the mother of Alexander Neckam and wet nurse of Richard I of England. Hodierna is also known as Audierne.
According to legend, Richard I and Alexander Neckam were born on the same day. The astrological significance of these two births may be the reason Hodierna was chosen as wet nurse. The boys were breastfed together, although as heir to the throne Richard was given the right breast which was believed to produce richer milk.
Wet nurse to the young princes was an honoured position and Hodierna was given a home in the King's Houses. However, if Richard became ill or died, Hodierna could be blamed. Transitioning into a nanny role as Richard got older, Hodierna was Richard's main source of maternal affection in his early years as his mother was often away.
Richard did not forget Hodierna as he got older. Records show that when he was King, Richard gave Hodierna a generous pension.
The village of West Knoyle in Wiltshire was formerly known as Knoyle Hodierne after her.


Cleopatra Doumbia-Henry

Dr. Cleopatra Doumbia-Henry is President of the World Maritime University. She is an international lawyer, a global leader on maritime law, labour standards and labour law, and law of international organizations. Dr. Doumbia-Henry is a distinguished academic in the field of international law and an international advocate for sustainability and innovation.Appointed by the Secretary-General of the International Maritime Organization (IMO), Dr. Doumbia-Henry became the seventh President, the first woman President and the first from a developing country of the World Maritime University (WMU), a university established within the framework of the IMO.
Professional career.
President of the World Maritime University.
As the Chief Executive Officer of WMU, she oversees and directs the operations and administration of the University, positioning it as the global centre of excellence in maritime and ocean education, research and capacity building, taking on board the UN SDGs.
Senior positions at the International Labour Organization (ILO).
Prior to joining WMU, Dr. Doumbia-Henry held various senior positions at the International Labour Organization (ILO), another specialized agency of the United Nations. She joined the ILO in 1986 and served as Senior Legal Officer in the Office of the Legal Adviser; Director, Sectoral Activities Department before taking up the position as Director of the International Labour Standards Department. During her tenure as Director of the International Labour Standards Department (first woman Director since the establishment of the ILO in 1919), Dr. Doumbia-Henry was responsible for the ILO’s international labour standards policy and for the ILO’s supervisory bodies and procedures governing international labour standards. She led the department to effectively assist the ILO member States on the implementation of their international obligations (more than 400 Conventions and Recommendations) including through technical assistance, advice, research and capacity building programmes. She spearheaded the development of the innovative and historic ILO Maritime Labour Convention (MLC), 2006 which consolidated 68 international labour instruments. The MLC, 2006 as amended has been ratified to date by 91 member States to date covering more than 80 per cent of the world tonnage of ships. Dr. Doumbia-Henry also led the ILO’s participation in a number of IMO/ILO inter-agency collaborations on several issues of common interest, including the Joint IMO/ILO Ad Hoc Expert Working Groups on Fair Treatment of Seafarers and on Liability and Compensation regarding Claims for Death, Personal Injury and Abandonment of Seafarers.
Maritime Labour Convention (MLC), 2006.
Dr. Doumbia-Henry spearheaded work on and had a special responsibility for the innovative and historic ILO Maritime Labour Convention, 2006 which consolidates 68 ILO instruments. This Convention has unparalleled success among ILO Conventions which is reflected in the high level of ratification of this Convention, 92 member States of the ILO covering more than 80 per cent of the world tonnage of ships. Today, the MLC, 2006 is an important ILO flagship instrument and one that paves the way for the modernization and greater impact of the existing body of ILO standards. Dr Doumbia-Henry is familiarly referred to as the Mother of the MLC, 2006.
Early career.
Dr. Doumbia-Henry began her career at the University of the West Indies, Barbados, as lecturer in law and later worked at the Iran-US Claims Tribunal in The Hague, the Netherlands.
Academic career.
Dr. Doumbia-Henry's qualifications include Barrister-at-Law and Solicitor, a PhD and LLM from the University of Geneva and the Graduate Institute of International Studies]], and a LLM and LLB from the University of West Indies. She has published extensively on a wide range of international law subjects.
References.
[[Category:Women lawyers]


Zoste patrikia

Zōstē patrikía () was a Byzantine court title reserved exclusively for the woman who was the chief attendant and assistant to the Empress. A very high title, its holder ranked as the first woman after the Empress herself in the imperial court. The title is attested from the 9th century until the 12th century, but only a handful of its holders are known.
History.
The title means "girded lady-patrician", often translated into English as "Mistress of the Robes", and was used for high-ranking court ladies who were attached to the Byzantine empresses as their ladies of honour. Its origin or date of institution are unclear.
Disregarding a clearly anachronistic reference to Antonina, the wife of the great 6th-century general Belisarius, as being a "zostē patrikia", the title is first attested in for Theoktiste, the mother of Empress Theodora.
The title is last attested in literary sources (the "Skylitzes Chronicle") in 1018, when it was conferred to Maria, the former Empress of Bulgaria, and finally in a series of lead seals dated to the late 11th century (see below). It disappears thereafter, along with many other titles of the middle Byzantine period, following the reforms of Emperor Alexios I Komnenos ().
Status and functions.
In Philotheos's "Klētorologion" of 899, the dignity of the "zostē patrikia" is placed very high in the imperial order of precedence, coming before the "magistros" and after the "kouropalatēs". Her exceptional status is further illustrated by the fact that she was one of only six dignitaries who dined at the imperial table—along with the Patriarch of Constantinople, the "Caesar", the "nōbelissimos", the "kouropalatēs" and the "basileopatōr"—and by the prominent role she played in imperial ceremonies, especially those revolving around the Empress, such as the coronation of an empress or the birth of a child. Although it appears that, in common with the other supreme dignities with which it is associated, there was a single holder of the dignity at each time, at the reception of Olga of Kiev, the plural form "zōstai" is used, indicating the presence of at least two. This may be accounted for by the fact that at times there were several empresses, and that each one must have had a "zōstē" in her particular service.
The "zōstē patrikia" functioned as the chief attendant to the empress (to whom she was usually related) and the head of the women's court (the "sekreton tōn gynaikōn"), which consisted mostly of the wives of high-ranking officials. Indeed, hers was the only specifically female dignity: other women bore the feminine versions of their husbands' titles. A "zōstē patrikia" is therefore, in John B. Bury's words, "the only lady who was πατρικία in her own right", and not to be confused with a simple "patrikia", who was the spouse or widow of a "patrikios". Indeed, the French scholar Rodolphe Guilland points out that the title itself appears to be a compound one, with the sources sometimes calling it "the "zōstē" and "patrikia"", indicating that the noble title of "patrikia" was added to the court dignity of "zōstē".
The "zōstē" was raised to the rank in an elaborate investiture ceremony in the Theotokos of the Pharos palace chapel, which is recorded in the "De Ceremoniis" (I.50) of Emperor Constantine VII Porphyrogennetos (). The ceremony ended in the Chrysotriklinos audience hall, where she received from the emperor's hands the ivory tablets that were the particular insignium of her office. She then visited the Hagia Sophia, where the tablets were blessed by the Patriarch, before making her way to the Magnaura, where she received the congratulations of the women of the court and the spouses of the high dignitaries. Finally, she returned to the Pharos chapel, where she deposited an offering of 70 "nomismata", before retiring to her apartments. The distinctive dress of the "zōstē", which probably gave the title her name, was the broad belt or "loros" that she put on at the investiture ceremony. A descendant of the ancient Roman consular "trabea", the golden "lōros" was the "most prestigious imperial insignium", and was also worn by the Byzantine emperor and a select few of his highest dignitaries such as the Eparch of Constantinople or the "magistroi". A less likely origin of the "zōstē" may derive from her position as chief lady-in-waiting to the empress, among whose duties was to supervise her dress, or, as the "Patria of Constantinople" puts it, to "gird" the empress.
The "zōstē" held her title for life, even after the death of an empress she had been appointed to serve. In addition, like most Byzantine titles, the dignity could be conferred as a simple honour without the requirement of service, as was most likely the case with Theoktiste and Maria, the widow of Tsar Ivan Vladislav of Bulgaria.
List of known holders.
Despite the prominence of their title, the sources mention but rarely the "zōstai". As Rodolphe Guilland writes, "confined to the women's quarters of the empress, they hardly had the opportunity to become known. Certainly the women's quarters were sometimes a hotbed of intrigue and scandal; but the noise of these intrigues and these scandals hardly crossed the walls of the Great Palace."


Ida Lewis

Idawalley Zoradia Lewis (February 25, 1842 – October 24, 1911) was an American lighthouse keeper noted for her heroism in rescuing people from the seas.
Biography.
Early years.
Ida Lewis was born in Newport, Rhode Island, the second oldest of four children of Captain Hosea Lewis of the Revenue-Marine. Her father was transferred to the Lighthouse Service and appointed keeper of Lime Rock Light on the small near-island Lime Rock in Newport in 1854, taking his family to live on the rock in 1857. After the family had been at Lime Rock for less than four months, he suffered a stroke and became disabled. Ida Lewis expanded her domestic duties to include caring for him and a seriously ill sister and also, with her mother's assistance, tending the light: filling the lamp with oil at sundown and again at midnight, trimming the wick, polishing carbon off the reflectors, and extinguishing the light at dawn.
Since Lime Rock was almost completely surrounded by water, the only way to reach the mainland was by boat. By age 15, Lewis had become known as the best swimmer in Newport. She rowed her younger siblings to school every weekday and fetched supplies from town as they were needed. She became very skillful at handling her heavy rowboat. Responding to criticism that it was un-ladylike for women to row boats, Lewis said that "None – but a donkey, would consider it 'un-feminine', to save lives."
Lewis and her mother tended the Lime Rock Light for her father from 1857 until 1873 when he died. Her mother was then appointed keeper, although Ida continued to do the keeper's work. By 1877 her mother's health was failing, leaving Ida with increased housekeeping and care-giving responsibilities. Her mother eventually died of cancer in 1878. Ida finally received the official appointment as keeper in 1879, largely through the efforts of an admirer, General Ambrose Everett Burnside, a Civil War hero who became a Rhode Island governor and United States senator. With a salary of $750 per year, Lewis was for a time the highest-paid lighthouse keeper in the nation. The extra pay was given "in consideration of the remarkable services of Mrs. Wilson in the saving of lives".
Accomplishments.
Lewis made her first rescue in 1854, coming to the assistance of four men whose boat had capsized. She was 12 years old.
Her most famous rescue occurred on March 29, 1869. Two soldiers, Sgt. James Adams and Pvt. John McLaughlin, were passing through Newport Harbor toward Fort Adams in a small boat, guided by a 14-year-old boy who claimed to know his way through the harbor. A snowstorm was churning the harbor's waters, and the boat overturned. The two soldiers clung to it while the boy was lost, dying in the icy water. Lewis's mother saw the two in the water and called to Ida, who was suffering from a cold. Ida ran to her boat without taking the time to put on a coat or shoes. With the help of her younger brother, she was able to haul the two men into her boat and bring them to the lighthouse. One of them later gave a gold watch to Lewis. The soldiers at Fort Adams showed their appreciation by collecting $218 for her. On July 16, 1881, she was awarded the rare Gold Lifesaving Medal from the United States government – the first woman to receive it – for her rescue on February 4, 1881, of two soldiers from Fort Adams who had fallen through the ice while attempting to return to the fort on foot.
Because of her many rescues, Lewis became the best-known lighthouse keeper of her day. During her 54 years on Lime Rock she is credited with saving 18 lives, although unofficial reports suggest the number may have been as high as 25. She kept no records of her lifesaving exploits. Lewis's fame spread quickly following the 1869 rescue, as a reporter was sent from the "New-York Tribune" to record her deeds. Articles also appeared in "Harper's Weekly" and "Leslie's" magazine, among others. The Life Saving Benevolent Association of New York sent her a silver medal. A parade was held in her honor in Newport on Independence Day, followed by the presentation of a sleek, mahogany rowboat with red velvet cushions, gold braid around the gunwales, and gold-plated oar-locks. When she was 64, Lewis became a life beneficiary of the Carnegie Hero Fund, receiving a monthly pension of $30.
During her lifetime, Lewis was called "the Bravest Woman in America" and her exploits were detailed in the national press. She met President Ulysses S. Grant, Vice-President Schuyler Colfax, General William Tecumseh Sherman, and Admiral George Dewey, in addition to many of the wealthy and prominent people who summered in Newport. Members of the Women's suffrage movement – including Elizabeth Cady Stanton – came to visit her and used her as an example of the inherent strength of women. At least two pieces of music were named for her: the "Ida Lewis Waltz", and the "Rescue Polka Mazurka". Ida Lewis hats and scarves were sold.
Later years.
Her father amused himself by counting the people who came to the island to see Ida: there were often a hundred a day, and in one summer, there were 9,000. She also received numerous gifts, letters, and even marriage proposals. In 1870, she married Captain William Wilson of Black Rock, Connecticut, but they separated after two years, and she returned to Lime Rock. She spent most of her career alone there.
Lewis made her last recorded rescue when she was 63. A friend was rowing out to the lighthouse, stood up in her boat, lost her balance, and fell into the water. Lewis rowed out to her and hauled her aboard.
Lewis died of a stroke on October 24, 1911, at the age of 69. The bells of all the vessels in Newport Harbor tolled for her that night, and flags were at half-staff throughout Newport. More than 1,400 people viewed her body at the Thames Street Methodist Church. Among the crowd that gathered to pay its respects were several keepers: Charles Schoeneman, of the Newport Harbor Light; Charles Curtis of the Rose Island Light, O. F. Kirby of Gull Rocks Light; and Edward Fogerty of the Brenton Reef Lightship. The captain and crew of a local life-saving station in Newport were also present. Ida Lewis was buried in the Common Burying Ground, in a prominent location, so her grave can be seen by passersby.
Legacy.
In 1924 the Rhode Island legislature officially changed the name of Lime Rock to Ida Lewis Rock. The lighthouse service changed the name of the Lime Rock Lighthouse to the Ida Lewis Rock Lighthouse – the only such honor ever paid to a keeper in the United States. It is now the clubhouse of the Ida Lewis Yacht Club. The burgee of the Ida Lewis Yacht Club features a lighthouse with 18 stars, representing the 18 people rescued by Ida Lewis.
In 1995, the United States Coast Guard named the first of a new class of buoy tenders for Ida Lewis. The USCGC "Ida Lewis" (WLM-551), the lead ship of the 175' Keeper class, is stationed at Middletown, Rhode Island.
The folk song "Lighthouse Keeper" by Neptune's Car was inspired by the experiences of women lighthouse tenders including Lewis, Katherine Walker, and Abbie Burgess.
Ida Lewis' Gold Lifesaving Medal, along with two other medals awarded to her and other artifacts, are in the collections of the Newport Historical Society.
In 2017, a Google Doodle commemorated her 175th birthday. The same day, the United States Coast Guard Northeast division posted a tweet honoring her birthday; it was later re-tweeted by the US Coast Guard main handle.
In 2018, Ida Lewis became the first woman to have a road named after her at Arlington National Cemetery; the road is called Lewis Drive.
English folk singer Reg Meuross's 2019 album "RAW" includes a song called "The Eyes of Ida Lewis". The song tells the story of Ida Lewis in the voice of an imagined suitor whose life she had saved.


Sly Bailey

Sylvia Bailey, née Grice (born 24 January 1962), is a former chief executive of Trinity Mirror, the UK's largest newspaper publisher, and a non-executive director of EMI from 2004 to 2007. She was named as one of the "50 Most Powerful Women in Britain" by "Management Today" and as one of Britain’s most influential women by the "Daily Mail". She was also named as one of the top 20 most influential figures in media by MediaGuardian and as one of the top 50 most powerful businesswomen outside the United States by "Fortune". She left Trinity Mirror, six months earlier than planned, in June 2012.
Early life.
She was educated at St. Saviour's and St. Olave's Grammar School for Girls, in Southwark, south-east London. In 1978 she briefly attended the Italia Conti Academy of Theatre Arts.
Career.
Bailey began her career as a make-up artist for Revlon. In 1984 she joined "The Guardian" newspaper working in advertising sales. Bailey became advertising manager at "The Independent" newspaper in 1987.
Trinity Mirror.
Bailey joined Trinity Mirror as chief executive in February 2003.
On 30 June 2008, Trinity Mirror issued a trading statement forecasting a 10% reduction in anticipated profits, leading to a collapse in the share price to a low of 73.5p, compared to its 12-month high of 557.5p.
"The Independent"s media columnist Stephen Glover pointed out that the company's market value had slumped from £1.5 bn to £250m, and commented: "... it is difficult to see how Sly Bailey, Trinity Mirror's preposterously well-rewarded chief executive, can remain much longer in her job . . . "
In July 2011 Bailey launched an investigation into editorial controls and procedures at Mirror Group newspapers following allegations of phone hacking. In October 2011, Bailey became the first serving media proprietor to appear at the Leveson Inquiry into phone hacking.
Late on 3 May 2012 it was announced that Bailey was to leave her post at Trinity Mirror by the end of the year, but she in fact left in mid June. The General Secretary of the National Union of Journalists, Michelle Stanistreet, said of her at the time: "Finally, Sly Bailey is doing the decent thing and leaving the company she has led into monumental decline." Reportedly, she received a £900,000 payoff.
Other activities.
Sly Bailey has been on the Press Association board since 2003. She was awarded an Honorary Degree from the University of East London in 2005.


Misty Lee

Misty Lee is an American voice actress, comedian and magician.
Early life.
Misty Lee was born in Mount Clemens, Michigan, and spent most of her childhood in Detroit, which she credits as inspiration for her unique sense of humor and interest in magic. Before her calling as a magician, Lee trained in dentistry. At the age of sixteen, she discovered her interest in magic, which quickly took its hold on her.
Career.
Her onstage performances blend theatre, song, and sleight of hand. She has appeared (as herself) in several comic books, and is a co-creator (and also the voice) of Dinicartoons character Little Rashy. Lee's first venture into magic came when a former high school friend called her and asked if she would like to earn some money as an assistant in his magic act. She was later mentored by some of the leading names in professional magic, including Detroit-based magician Scorpio and illusionist Jonathan Pendragon.
In addition to magic, Lee is a prolific voice actor, appearing in award-winning video games such as "The Last of Us", "BioShock Infinite", "Grand Theft Auto V", "Disney Infinity", the "Fire Emblem" series and more.
She also provided the voice of Aunt May Parker in "Ultimate Spider-Man", which airs on Disney XD. At Comic-Con International, Lee designed and taught custom effects to celebrity host and presenters for the “Magic of Comics” themed awards show.
In July 2017, Lee performed on the show , but failed to fool the hosts.
Lee studied and performed both sketch and musical improv comedy at The Second City in Los Angeles.
She plays the character Misty Hannah in the backstory to "Ingress".
Contributions to magic.
In 2010, Lee became a staff Séance Medium at Hollywood's Magic Castle, where she regularly performs Houdini Séances. She is the first female magician in history to hold this position.
Lee is the only magician ever to be admitted into the Institute for Analytic Interviewing. Under the training of “Truth Wizard” J.J. Newberry, and alongside agents from the CIA, ATF, and Scotland Yard, Lee mastered the art of cognitive interview techniques, giving her the nickname of "Human Lie Detector."
Personal life.
Lee is married to animation producer and comic book author Paul Dini, with whom she lives in Los Angeles. Their two Boston terriers, Mugsy and Deuce, were featured in "Anger Management", a 2012 episode of "The Dog Whisperer", in which they sought Cesar Millan's help with their dogs' behavioral problems. Around this time, Dini began an extensive weight loss and exercise regimen, having reached a weight of 320 pounds.
She is fluent in American Sign Language and has worked as a theatrical sign interpreter for Michigan State University.
Lee is an activist against domestic abuse. In 2013, Lee wrote and starred in a short PSA on behalf of the Domestic Violence Hotline titled "Escape". The video is a “love letter to [her] mother,” who endured years of verbal abuse.


Maria Tescanu Rosetti

Maria Tescanu Rosetti (1879–1968), was a Romanian aristocrat and royal court official.
Born in Berești-Tazlău, Bacău County, she was a lady-in-waiting to queen Marie of Romania. She was married to Mihail G. Cantacuzino, lover of Nae Ionescu, and secondly married to composer George Enescu. She was the mother of the aviator Constantin Cantacuzino.
During World War I, she was the central figure in a scandal at a Iași hospital, where she had forced wounded soldiers to perform for her and her guests during banquets. In February 1918, she was one of a group of female aristocrats who, supported by the queen, participated in a demonstration against the war policy of Prime Minister General Alexandru Averescu.
She died in Geneva at age 90, and was buried at Père Lachaise Cemetery in Paris.


Benedetta Barzini

Benedetta Barzini (born September 22, 1943, in Porto Santo Stefano) is an Italian actress and model, daughter of Italian journalist and author Luigi Barzini, Jr. and his first wife, Giannalisa Feltrinelli. As such, she is the half-sister of Giangiacomo Feltrinelli, the Italian publisher and left-wing political activist.
Career.
Barzini was discovered at age 20 on the streets of Rome by Consuelo Crespi in 1963; Diana Vreeland soon thereafter received photographs of Barzini and sent a telegram asking if she could come to Manhattan to shoot for American "Vogue" with Irving Penn. She did so, and within ten days, she was signed with Ford Models. She hence established a successful fashion career in New York City, working with other notable fashion photographers such as Ugo Mulas, Richard Avedon, and Henry Clarke. Barzini appeared on the cover of the first issue of "Vogue Italia" in November 1965, and became the first Italian model to be featured on the cover of American "Vogue".
In December 1966, Barzini was named one of the "100 Great Beauties of the World" by the American fashion magazine" Harper's Bazaar". She began training at the Actors Studio around that time, and in the process became romantically involved with, and later engaged to, New York poet and media artist Gerard Malanga, an early collaborator of Andy Warhol. He would dedicate various works to her, such as his "Poems for Benedetta Barzini" and "The Last Benedetta Poems". Additionally, Malanga's 1967 black-and-white film "In Search of the Miraculous" is an emotional, vivid poem of adoration for Barzini.
Barzini became friends with and muse to artists including Salvador Dalí, Lee Strasberg, Bert Stern, and Richard Avedon in the course of her career. She also started hanging out at Andy Warhol's Factory and was headed for the top rank of New York models, but decided to return to Italy in 1968 to act. She met Italian film director Roberto Faenza, and they married in 1969. On the night she gave birth to twins, Nini and Giacomo, Faenza left her. She later married graphic designer Antonio Barrese and had two additional children.
Activism and teaching.
In 1973, Barzini left the modeling business to become a Marxist, member of the Italian Communist Party, and radical feminist organizer in Milan. As of 2008, she was teaching in at the Polytechnic University of Milan and New Academy of Fine Arts, also in Milan, and at the University of Urbino, lecturing on subjects such as problematic images of women in fine art and the mass media. She guest-lectured at academic institutions such as the Italian University for Design. She retired from teaching sometime in the 2010s.
In media.
The 2019 documentary film, "The Disappearance of My Mother", was directed by Beniamino Barrese, Barzini’s son. The film showed at the London Film Festival 2019, Sundance, and other festivals, events, and venues, charting in at the 32nd Annual European Film Awards.


Raveena Desraj Shrestha

Raveena Desraj Shrestha () (born 27 April 1970), is a Nepalese Banker and a media personality. Shrestha is the Deputy Chief Executive Officer of Mega Bank Nepal Limited. Shrestha is a recipient of several national/international awards and a noted name in the banking/entertainment sector of Nepal. Shrestha was elected as the vice-chairman of Women Entrepreneur Development Committee appointed by the (FNCCI) and was also on the list of powerful women who made history in Nepal in 2018. Shrestha has also been featured in many magazines and newspapers where she has done photoshoots, brand endorsements, pageant judging, show stopping, coaching, campaigning etc.
Early life.
Shrestha was born on 27 April 1970 to Puran Desraj Shrestha, an aeronautical engineer, and Shanti Desraj Shrestha. She has an elder brother, Rajiv Desraj Shrestha. She has two children, Ayushman and Aashirman both are Nepalese film actors and models. She spent her childhood in Kalimpong, West Bengal, India and studied in a missionary school, Dr. Graham's Homes. She completed her high school from Modern Indian School, Nepal. She did her Bachelor of Arts from Shri Shikshayatan College, Kolkata, India, and has a master's degree in Rural Development from Indira Gandhi National Open University.
Career.
Shrestha started her career as trainee assistant in Standard Chartered Bank, later served as the business development manager and worked there from 1992 to 2005. She joined Nabil Bank as the chief consumer banking and worked there from 2005 to 2010. Shrestha then joined Mega Bank Nepal Limited as the chief business officer and corporate affairs and is now the DCEO of the bank. Apart from her banking profession, she is also involved in the entertainment sector and various development programs of Nepal. Shrestha also did a cameo in a thriller movie, "Soul Sister". Shrestha is also a qualified Hypnotherapist, a Certified Life Coach, a Certified Angel Card reader (all from the USA) and a practitioner of other alternative Healing techniques.
Recognition.
Shrestha is a recipient of multiple national and international awards. She has won two 21st Century Golden Phoenix Award from Malaysia-based Asia Excellence Entrepreneur Federation one in 2014 and the other in 2015. Shrestha also won the Lady of Excellence Award where she was competing against 613 entrepreneur women from Asia in 2014. Shrestha was one of the Top 100 Inspirational Women of Nepal in 2018 ranking in the 17th position. Shrestha is also the vice-chairman of Women Entrepreneur Development Committee appointed by the Federation of Nepalese Chambers of Commerce and Industry (FNCCI) for her two-decade long contribution in uplifting women entrepreneurship while working as a banker. Shrestha is a member of Nepal Chamber Of Commerce (NCC) in the Bank, Finance & Insurance Committee. Shrestha was also on the list of powerful women who made history in Nepal in 2018. Shrestha was also a guest speaker in TEDx Youth@Gyaneshwor on 17 May 2019, speaking about 'The Essence of Networking'.


Inger Lut Debois

Inger Merete Lut Debois née Andersen (1931–2015) was a Danish painter. She is remembered for her works with interacting figures which became increasingly abstract as she matured. In 1992, Debois decorated the IC3 train "Thyra Danebod". From 1992 to 2000, she headed Kvindelige Kunstneres Samfund (KKS), the Danish Society of Female Artists.
Biography.
Born on 15 July 1931 in Vejle, Inger Merete Lut Andersen was the daughter of Major Svend Halvor Andersen and Rigmor Marie Andersen. In 1952, she married the painter and photographer Sven Arne Debois from Iceland. Their daughter Jette Debois (born 1956) is also a painter.
She attended the painting school at the Royal Danish Academy of Fine Arts where she studied under William Scharff, graduating in 1956. Her early works depicted figures in psychic relationships. They later developed into more abstract paintings in which strong colour and brush strokes are the dominant elements.
Debois exhibited at the Charlottenborg Spring Exhibitions from 1962 to 1985, apart from 1975 to 1981 when she was a member of the selection committee. Her works were also included in the KKS Jubilee Exhibition at the Skovgaard Museum in 1977. More recently, many of her remaining paintings together with some of her daughter Jette's early works were included at the 2018 exhibition of five women artists in Korsør.
In addition to her creative work, for many years Debois devoted time and energy to organizational responsibilities. In particular, from 1902 to 2002 she headed the Society of Female Artists where she contributed to the visibility and influence of women artists.
Inger Lut Debois died in Copenhagen on 19 February 2015.


Mary Inman

Ida Mary Inman (1894–1985), known as Mary Inman, was an American political activist and writer. Inman is best known for her 1940 book, "In Woman's Defense," which was a pioneering effort to legitimize the domestic labor associated with homemaking as worthy and respectable field of human endeavor.
Biography.
Early years.
Ida Mary Inman, known to her friends as "Mary," was born June 11, 1894 in the state of Kentucky. She was the youngest of nine children. In 1900 the family moved to the Indian Territory, part of today's Oklahoma, and Mary Inman remained there for the next 17 years.
Inman's mother died in 1905 and her older sister followed two years later, forcing Mary to begin assuming primary homemaking tasks for the large family at an early age.
During the first decade of the 20th century, Oklahoma was a hotbed of activity for the Socialist Party of America and in 1910, when she was just 16, Inman joined that organization. She met her future husband, J. Frank Ryan, an organizer for the Oil Workers' Union of the Industrial Workers of the World (IWW) not long after. A long courtship ensued before the pair were finally married in July 1917. The honeymoon proved short-lived, however, as anti-Wobbly sentiment grew more bitter and violent during the wartime years, exploding after the suppression of the August 1917 Green Corn Rebellion, which was blamed on the IWW in the press. In November 1917 the couple found themselves forced to flee Tulsa to avoid anti-IWW vigilantes.
Inman and her husband moved to Kansas City, Missouri, where, in an attempt to keep government agents and anti-IWW vigilantes at bay, they assumed Mary's surname rather than his. This temporary expedient was later formalized by both Mary and Frank with a legal change of name.
"In Woman's Defense".
Although there is no exact date or reason for their relocation, at some point Mary and Frank Inman moved to Southern California, where they became active in the Communist Party USA (CPUSA). Frank went to work for the Pacific Telephone and Telegraph Company and Mary rented a small office in Los Angeles, where she set to work writing a book on women's labor, emphasizing women's work in the home as a worthy pursuit. The 600 page manuscript was completed in 1936 but was initially rejected by the CPUSA as unsatisfactory for the party press. Instead, Inman began working with former Wobbly turned Communist Harrison George, then the editor of the party's West Coast newspaper, "People's World," based in San Francisco. George began publishing Inman's manuscript in weekly installments in the paper.
In 1940 these published articles were collected in hard covers as a book entitled "In Woman's Defense." Several printings were needed to satisfy demand for the work.
"In Woman's Defense" drew upon Inman's experience as a young girl keeping house for her father and siblings. Inman expanded upon the observation of CPUSA women's leader Margaret Cowl that "all women are in an unequal position with men in all countries," making the novel argument that in addition to the exploitation they suffered on the basis of their class position, women as a whole were additionally members of a super-exploited social group based upon their gender.
While Inman's work was at first warmly received by several top Communist women leaders, including Elizabeth Gurley Flynn and Ella Reeve Bloor, the mood changed in 1941 when the CPUSA leadership began an official attack on Inman's work for purported ideological deviation. A series of articles written against Inman's ideas appeared in the party's literary monthly, "The New Masses," and the polemic was extended with the publication of a pamphlet by A. Landy, "Marxism and the Woman Question."
Despite the hostility on the part of the Communist Party, Inman moved forward with the publication of another book in 1942, "Woman Power," a work which incorporated the remainder of her 1936 manuscript.
Subsequent political career.
From 1943 to 1946, Inman published an edited a newspaper called "Facts for Women," into which she incorporated much of her journalistic energy. Among Inman's unrealized ideas was a desire to form an organization of housewives called the Union of Labor-Power Production Workers (housewives).
Inman's alienation from the Communist Party reached its peak in 1949 when she published a bitter mimeographed polemic against the CPUSA's policy towards women, entitled "Thirteen Years of CPUSA Misleadership on the Woman Question."
Inman's final book was published in 1964, entitled "The Two Forms of Production Under Capitalism." Inman remained dedicated to the so-called "Woman Question," engaging CPUSA General Secretary Gus Hall with a 66-page letter in 1972 and writing a lengthy article for the party's theoretical magazine, "Political Affairs," in 1973.
Death and legacy.
Mary Inman's papers are housed in five archival boxes, one folder, and one folio volume at the Arthur and Elizabeth Schlesinger Library on the History of Women in America at Harvard University in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Use of this material is open to researchers.


Margo Reuten

Margo Reuten (Maasbracht, abt. 1966) is a Dutch head chef, known for her cooking in the Michelin starred restaurant Da Vinci. From 2009 till 2018, she was the only female head chef in the Netherlands holding two Michelin stars.
Reuten describes her cooking style as "classic French" and "loyal to the region". For her classic dishes she uses as much as possible locally sourced ingredients.
Career.
Restaurant Da Vinci was opened in 1993. It carries one Michelin star since 1999 and two from 2009 till 2018.
Before Reuten opened restaurant Da Vinci, she had already a lot of experience on high culinary level. She worked as sous chef in restaurant Der Bloasbalg, at that moment bestowed with a Michelin star. Other restaurants where she worked and trained were Toine Hermsen (sous chef), De Swaen (chef de partie) and Prinses Juliana (apprentice chef).
Personal life.
Reuten was raised in Maasbracht and is married to Petro Kools.
Published books.
Together with Petro Kools:


Martha Farley


Sophie Muller

Sophie Luise Elisabeth Muller (born 31 January 1962) is a prolific British music video director from London, who has produced more than 300 music videos. She won a Grammy Award for Annie Lennox's 1992 "Diva" video album, and an MTV Video Music Award for Lennox's song "Why" from the same album. In 1993 she won a BRIT Award for "Stay" by Shakespears Sister. In 1997, she won another MTV Award for "Don't Speak" by No Doubt. Muller is a longtime collaborator with Sade, Annie Lennox, Gwen Stefani, Sophie Ellis-Bextor, Garbage and Shakespears Sister. Her daughter (who appeared in the music video for Mika's Grace Kelly when she was 10) is singer Mae Muller.
Muller is also known for creating cover art for albums, and for providing photographs and art direction for advertising campaigns, concert tours, concert films, and television commercials.
Background.
Sophie Muller was born in London, but spent her early years on the Isle of Man. After leaving secondary education, she returned to London to attend Central St Martins, gaining a Foundation Diploma in Art. She befriended Sade there; the two later worked together.
Following her graduation, Muller went to the Royal College of Art to study for her Masters in Film and Television, where she made "Interlude" and "In Excelsis Deo" (In Adoration of God). The latter won the J. Walter Thompson Prize for creativity.
Her trademark style of a singer or a band inside a dim room started with "I Need a Man" by Eurhythmics, shot in 1987.
Career.
Muller's first taste of professional film came working as a third assistant on the 1984 horror/thriller "Company of Wolves". She then went on to work for International Film and Video, honoring her for her editing, producing, and directing skills.
Muller's goal was to become a successful director in her own right, and her big break came through a chance meeting with John Stewart (brother of Eurythmics' Dave Stewart) and Billy Poveda of Oil Factory, an established film production company.
She has directed over three hundred music videos and has been a longtime collaborator with Sophie Ellis-Bextor, No Doubt, Shakespears Sister, Garbage, Blur, Annie Lennox and Eurythmics. Her work with Annie Lennox won her a Grammy for the "Diva" video album. She also picked up an MTV Video Music Award for Lennox's 1992 hit "Why", and was also Grammy nominated for the Eurythmics' 1987 "Savage" video album. In total, Muller has directed over twenty videos for Lennox and Eurythmics and has a longtime collaboration with producer Rob Small.
The video she directed for "Stay" by Shakespears Sister was spoofed by many British comedians at the time, including French & Saunders and Mr. Blobby, and won the BRIT Award and The Music Week Award for Best Video at both of the ceremonies' 1993 Awards.
She has directed fifteen videos for Sophie Ellis-Bextor, including "Take Me Home", "Murder on the Dancefloor", "Catch You", two versions of "Music Gets the Best of Me" and "Love Is a Camera".
Muller directed nine videos for No Doubt as well as nine solo videos for Gwen Stefani. When No Doubt's "Don't Speak" won the award for Best Group Video at the 1997 MTV Video Music Awards, Stefani thanked her extensively, saying "I'd like to say that Sophie Muller is a genius." Stefani has also stated, Sophie Muller is one of my most talented friends. She can and will only do projects that she is inspired by. She is driven by creativity and the love for what she does and as a result she never compromises. I consider her a true artist. I was a fan of Sophie's work before I even imagined working with her. She has a very pronounced style and taste that drew me in. I think she has the gift of being able to bring out the artist's personality, emotion and style. After working with her for the first time on our "Don't Speak" video, we became close friends [...]. On the set her direction is humble and simple, but she knows what she wants and knows when she gets it. A woman in charge in the male-dominated world of filmmaking makes the whole experience that much more exciting. [...] She has a way of making every cut have a reason and meaning. The videos have a life of their own and become better each time you watch them. I am always in shock the first time I see them and then after a few more times I am actually amazed. She has taught me a lot and I feel very lucky to have worked with her.
The artwork for The Jesus and Mary Chain's 1994 album, "Stoned & Dethroned", and the singles accompanying it, is composed entirely of stills from the video to the group's song "Sometimes Always", which was directed by Muller. She also directed the video for "Come On", which also appears on the album.
Muller states that her only ambition is to continue directing to her own high standards and to never grow bored. In 2004, she directed the socially aware video for Sarah McLachlan's "World on Fire", where all but $15 of the entire $150,000 video budget was donated to charities. Recently, she has directed videos for Shakira, Mika, Kings of Leon, Brandon Flowers, Tom Odell and the critically acclaimed video for the Dixie Chicks, "Not Ready to Make Nice".
Videography.
1980s.
1982
1987
1988
1989
1990s.
1990
1991
1992
1993
1994
1995
1996
1997
1998
1999
2000s.
2000
2001
2002
2003
2004
2005
2006
2007
2008
2009
2010s.
2010
2011
2012
2013
2014
2015
2016
2017
2018
2019
2020s.
2020
2021


Zolita

Zoë Montana Hoetzel (born September 23, 1994), known professionally as Zolita, is an American singer-songwriter. She gained viral success with the music video for "Explosion", which has over sixteen million views on YouTube as of December 2020. Following its success, she released the music videos for the singles "Holy" (2016) and "Fight Like a Girl" (2017) directed by herself. On October 13, 2015 she released independently her debut extended play "Immaculate Conception", and on May 18, 2018 she released her second extended play "Sappho".
Early life and career.
Zolita was born on September 23, 1994, in New York to Heidi Schwarck and Holger Hoetzel, and was raised in Calabasas, California. Her father is of German descent, and her mother is of Danish descent. Her father inspired her to start making music and she grew up playing bluegrass and flat pick guitar.
She has a brother, Max, a basketball player, and a sister, Luna, a YouTuber and ballerina. She and her siblings all share the middle name Montana.
She started her career with the music video for "Explosion" which gained viral success, it was also listed on "Billboard"s list of "30 Lesbian Love Songs". She further released the second video for the single "Holy", the concept is exploring themes of female sexuality, spirituality, and feminism. On October 13, 2015 she released her debut extended play "Immaculate Conception". In 2017 she released the first single from her second extended play "Sappho" titled "Fight Like a Girl", which is a protest song with feminist themes inspired by the 2016 presidential campaign of Donald Trump. On October 26, 2017 she released "Come Home with Me" as the second single, and on May 4, 2018 she released "New You" as the third single from her second extended play "Sappho" which was released on May 18 of that year. On December 5, 2018 she released "Truth Tea" along with a music video as the lead single from her debut album, "Evil Angel". On March 8, 2019 she released "Black Magic" along with a visual video, however, the song wasn't included on the final tracklist of her debut album. On June 28, 2019 she released "Shut Up and Cry" along with a lyric video as the second single from "Evil Angel". On February 14, 2020 she released a cover of Usher's song "U Remind Me" with a music video. On August 7, 2020 she released "Oblivion" along with a music video as the third single from "Evil Angel". On September 25 of the same year she released "Bedspell" as the fourth single from the album, and on November 20 she premiered the music video on the online magazine's website "Them." The promotional single, "Loveline" was released a week before the album's release, and on December 4, 2020 her debut studio album, "Evil Angel", was released.
Artistry.
Zolita's music has been described as "a blend of dark-pop and R&B". Her musical style incorporates witchcraft and religion. She says that religious and witchcraft magic aesthetics are a huge part of her life saying "I feel like queer people are so drawn to Wicca and witchcraft because it's always been the alternative religion, it puts the power in yourself, and it's not historically been a religion that doesn't like queer people." She also cites Lady Gaga as her biggest influence.
Personal life.
Zolita is an open lesbian, and she identifies herself as a feminist. She came out at an early age. In a 2017 interview she expressed how lucky she was for growing in a liberal family surrounded by open-minded friends. In her school days, she was afraid to come out to her female friends, saying "I was also worried that my female friends would no longer want to have girls' nights or sleepovers for fear that I might be attracted to them. So, I decided to keep my newfound queerness a secret." She also identifies herself as a witch, she explains this in videos on her YouTube channel, but also in her music videos where witchcraft is incorporated.


Helen Young Hayes

Helen Young Hayes, CFA, (born July 11, 1962 in Oakland, California), is an investment fund manager best known for her success in running the Janus Worldwide Fund and Janus Overseas Fund. Prior to that she was a research associate at Fred Alger Management. She is a member of the Advisory Committee at Red Rocks Capital LLC.
Hayes attended Starkville High School and Yale University. In 2002 Hayes was promoted to oversee all Janus funds.
Morning Star analyst Russell Kinnell picked her as the analyst most similar to Peter Lynch, and in 1997 she was named Mutual Fund Manager of the Year. She retired from Janus in 2003. Hayes now owns Activate Workforce Solutions, a company that mentors underutilized workers.
Personal life.
In 1989, Hayes was aboard United Airlines Flight 232 which crashed in Sioux City, Iowa. Her younger sister Claire ran the Janus Olympus Fund. As a hobby, Hayes runs triathlons.


Janet Shibley Hyde

Janet Shibley Hyde is the Helen Thompson Woolley Professor of Psychology and Gender & Women's Studies at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. She is known for her research on human sexuality, sex differences, gender development, gender and science, and feminist theory, and is considered one of the leading academics in the field of gender studies.
Biography.
Hyde received her BA in mathematics from Oberlin College in 1969. She continued her education at the University of California, Berkeley, where she completed her Ph.D in psychology in 1972. She received an honorary doctorate degree in social science from Denison University in 1996. Prior to joining the faculty of the University of Wisconsin-Madison in 1986, Hyde was a member of the faculty in the Department of Psychology at Bowling Green State University (1972-1979) and Denison University (1979-1986).
Published in 2005, "The Gender Similarities Hypothesis" is a focal point of Hyde's work in the field. In this influential study, Hyde conducted a series of meta-analyses that documented how similar males and females are on most psychological variables, which contrasted with how different they are often perceived to be.
The royalties from her co-authored textbook "Half the Human Experience" go to the Janet Hyde Graduate Student Research Grants to support doctoral psychology students in feminist research. Hyde is also co-author of the textbook "Understanding Human Sexuality."
Hyde received the Ernest R. Hilgard Lifetime Achievement Award presented by the American Psychological Association (APA) in 2016 and the James McKeen Cattell Fellow Award from the Association for Psychological Science in 2018. Previous awards include the Kinsey Award from the Society for the Scientific Study of Sexuality (1992), the Heritage Award from APA Division 35, Psychology of Women (1996), the Carolyn Wood Sherif Award from APA Division 35 (1998) for "Men are From Earth, Women are From Earth. The Media vs. Science on Psychological Gender Differences", the APA Award for Distinguished Service to Psychological Science (2008), the Pioneer in the Psychology of Women Award from the Association for Women in Psychology (2009), and the Committee on Women in Psychology Award for Distinguished Leadership (2014).


Susan Wild

Susan Ellis Wild (born June 7, 1957) is an American attorney and politician from the commonwealth of Pennsylvania. A Democrat, she is a member of the United States House of Representatives from . The district is located in the heart of the Lehigh Valley, and includes Allentown, Bethlehem, and Easton. She spent the last two months of 2018 as the member for after Charlie Dent resigned in 2018.
Early life.
Wild is the daughter of Norman Leith and Susan Stimus Ellis. Wild's mother was a journalist. Her father served in the United States Air Force during World War II and the Korean War. She was born at Wiesbaden Air Force Base, West Germany, while her father was stationed there. She also lived in France, California, New Mexico, and Washington D.C.
Early political career.
Wild volunteered on Jimmy Carter's 1976 presidential campaign. She graduated from American University in 1978. She earned her Juris Doctor at the George Washington University Law School in 1982. She studied under John Banzhaf. Wild became a partner at the law firm Gross McGinley in 1999.
Wild ran for Lehigh County Commissioner in 2013, but lost. She was appointed the first female solicitor of Allentown, Pennsylvania in January 2015. She served as Solicitor of Allentown starting on January 7, 2015, when she was confirmed by the Allentown City Council.
U.S. House of Representatives.
Elections.
On December 31, 2017, Wild resigned from office to pursue her candidacy for the United States House of Representatives to succeed retiring Representative Charlie Dent (R) in 2018. Dent's district had previously been the 15th, represented by seven-term Republican Charlie Dent. She won the Democratic Party primary election and faced Republican Lehigh County commissioner Marty Nothstein in the November 6 general election. She defeated Nothstein in the general election with 53.4% of the vote.
On the same day, Wild also ran in a separate special election for the balance of Dent's term; he had resigned in May after announcing the previous fall that he would not run for reelection. On November 15, 2018, it was announced that Wild had won the 15th congressional district's special election, receiving 130,353 votes to Nothstein's 129,593 votes.
There was a closer margin in the special election because that election was under the former 15th district, which had been thrown out by the Pennsylvania Supreme Court in February 2018. The former 15th had stretched from the Lehigh Valley into heavily Republican territory between Lebanon and Harrisburg, by way of a tendril in Berks County. The new 7th district is a more compact district centered in the Lehigh Valley, and includes a sliver of the Poconos.
Wild ran for reelection to a second term. She was unopposed in the Democratic primary and faced former Lehigh County commissioner Lisa Scheller in the general election. Wild defeated Scheller with 51.9% of the vote.
Tenure.
Upon taking office, Wild became the first Democrat to represent the Lehigh Valley since 1999. She had two months' more seniority than the rest of the large Democratic freshman class of 2018. She was one of four Democratic women elected from Pennsylvania in 2018. The others were Mary Gay Scanlon, Madeleine Dean and Chrissy Houlahan. The state's congressional delegation had previously been all male.
Wild has been critical of Brazil's president Jair Bolsonaro, for holding views characterized as 'far-right', 'misogynistic', 'homophobic' and 'anti-immigrant'. In March 2019, Wild and 29 other Democratic lawmakers wrote a letter to Secretary of State Mike Pompeo; the letter read in part, "Since the election of far-right candidate Jair Bolsonaro as president, we have been particularly alarmed by the threat Bolsonaro’s agenda poses to the LGBTQ+ community and other minority communities, women, labor activists, and political dissidents in Brazil. We are deeply concerned that, by targeting hard-won political and social rights, Bolsonaro is endangering Brazil’s long-term democratic future."
Donald Trump impeachment.
On December 10, 2019, Democrats on the House Judiciary Committee advanced two articles of impeachment against Republican President Donald Trump. On December 18, 2019, Wild voted 'Yes' on the first article of impeachment, "abuse of power", and 'Yes' on the second article of impeachment, "obstruction of Congress".
Personal life.
Wild and her husband, Russell Wild, divorced in 2003 after 22 years of marriage. They have two adult children, Clay and Adrienne. Following her divorce, Wild reunited with her law school boyfriend, Kerry Acker, who remained her life partner until his death on May 25, 2019. She lives in South Whitehall Township, west of Allentown. She is Jewish.


Esther Saperstein

Esther Richman Saperstein (October 22, 1901 – May 17, 1988) was an American legislator, women's rights advocate and mental health activist.
Esther Richman Saperstein was born in Chicago, Illinois to Jewish immigrants, Ellis Richman from Russia and Mary Dresser from Poland. Saperstein went to Chicago public schools and Northwestern University. Saperstein was active in the Parent-Teacher Association. In 1955, Saperstein ran for the Chicago City Council and lost the election. Saperstein was a Democrat. In 1957, Saperstein served in the Illinois House of Representatives and served until 1967. Saperstein then served in the Illinois State Senate from 1967 until 1975 when she resigned from the Illinois General Assembly. In 1975, Saperstein was elected to the Chicago City Council and served until 1979. Saperstein died at her home in Chicago, Illinois.


Paulette Sullivan Moore

Paulette Sullivan Moore is Delaware’s first African American female lawyer.
She completed her legal education at Rutgers University Law School (1976). In 1977, Moore became the first African American female admitted to practice law in Delaware. In the same year, she was admitted to practice before Delaware's U.S. District Court and the Third Circuit of the U.S. Court of Appeals. During the 1990s, Moore served as the New Castle County Recorder of Deeds. She has worked as a Policy Coordinator for the Delaware Coalition Against Domestic Violence and the Vice President of Public Policy of the National Network to End Domestic Violence.


Sandra Marquez

Sandra Marquez is a Jeff-Nominated actor, director, and educator based in Chicago. She is an ensemble member with Steppenwolf Theatre, Teatro Vista and Remy Bumppo Theatre Company.
Career.
Sandra Marquez is an actor, director, and educator. She is also a longtime ensemble member of Teatro Vista, the Midwest's only Equity Latino theatre company, where she served as the company's Associate Artistic Director from 1998-2006. Ms. Marquez has worked at respected companies in the Chicago area and beyond, including Goodman Theatre, Steppenwolf Theatre, Victory Gardens, Oregon Shakespeare Festival, Madison Repertory, and off-Broadway at Second Stage Theatre. She won a Jeff Award for her portrayal of Beatrice in Arthur Miller's A View from the Bridge. She directed "Men on the Verge of Hispanic Breakdown" for Pride Films and Plays and "My Manana Comes" for Teatro Vista. She played Clytemnestra in Aeschylus’ "Agamemnon" at Court Theatre in a new translation by Nicholas Rudall. She has been a member of the theatre faculty at Northwestern University since 1995.


Carla Blank

Carla Blank is an American writer, editor, educator, choreographer, and dramaturge. Based in the San Francisco Bay Area, for more than four decades she has been a performer, director, and teacher of dance and theater, particularly involved with youth and community arts projects.
Blank is editorial director of the Ishmael Reed Publishing Company, and has also lectured at such educational institutions as the University of California–Berkeley, Dartmouth College, and the University of Washington. She has written and edited a number of books, including "Rediscovering America: The Making of Multicultural America, 1900–2000" (2003), "Pow-Wow: Charting the Fault Lines in the American Experience, Short Fiction, From Then to Now" (2009), and "Storming the Old Boys’ Citadel: Two Pioneer Women Architects of Nineteenth Century North America" (2014).
Background.
Education and early career.
Carla Blank grew up in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, and after attending Carnegie Mellon University transferred to and graduated from Sarah Lawrence College. Having begun her career as a performer while still a child, after graduation she moved to New York City, where she studied ballet and made her debut as a choreographer in 1963, participating in the avant-garde Judson Dance Theater workshops.
Collaborations.
She collaborated for many years with Suzushi Hanayagi (1928–2010), and in 2009, with director Robert Wilson and others, created a multidisciplinary live performance portrait of Hanayagi entitled "KOOL, Dancing in My Mind", which had its premiere at New York City's Guggenheim Museum. A related 26-minute documentary film by Richard Rutkowski and Wilson, with the same title as the live work and including excerpts from the Guggenheim performance, premiered on Arte TV in France and the Sundance Channel in the U.S. in 2010, and an hour-long documentary, "The Space in Back of You", including an interview with Blank, premiered in January 2012 at Lincoln Center's film festival, Dance on Camera, where it was nominated for a jury prize.
From 2003 to 2011, Blank was involved with developing "The Domestic Crusaders", Wajahat Ali's play about three generations of a Pakistani-American family in the wake of 9/11. Beginning with a staged reading at Mehran Restaurant in Newark, California, in 2004, productions she directed include a 2009 showcase at Berkeley Repertory Theatre and its Off-Broadway debut, on September 11, 2009, at the Nuyorican Poets Café, an appearance at the 2010 MuslimFest in Mississauga, Canada, the Kennedy Center's Millennium Hall in Washington DC, on November 14, 2010, and as anchor of the 9/11 Performance Project at the Gerald W. Lynch Theater in New York, in September 2011.
In 2013, Blank directed an Al-Kasaba Theatre production of Philip Barry's "Holiday", performed in Arabic by a cast of Palestinian and Syrian actors. Premiered in their home theater in Ramallah, Palestine, its six-city West Bank tour ended at the Palestinian National Theatre in Jerusalem. In May 2015, Blank directed a production of Ishmael Reed's play "Mother Hubbard" in Xiangtan, China, and in September 2015 she directed "News From Fukushima", by Yuri Kageyama, at La Mama Café Theater in New York. The multidisciplinary work, developed further in 2017, was performed at Z Space in San Francisco, and became the basis for a 2018 film of the same title, receiving multiple film festival honors internationally including at the New Vision International Film Festival in Amsterdam, Berkeley's Video and Film Festival, the Oniros Film Awards in Italy, and ARS X SDGS.
Performance art teaching.
Blank has taught Performance Art at Dartmouth College, Harvard's Office of the Arts, and the University of Washington at Seattle, and has lectured on 20th-century art history at the University of California, Berkeley's departments of Dramatic Arts and Interdisciplinary Field Studies. She has lectured and given workshops at the University of Bologna in Italy, Université des Antilles–Guyane in Martinique, Charles University in the Czech Republic, the Naropa Institute's Jack Kerouac School of Disembodied Poetics, the Research Institute for North American Studies of the University of Alcalá, in Spain, and Beijing Normal University in China.
In 1977 she formed Roberts + Blank Dance Theater Inc. with Jody Roberts, whom she met while they were graduate students in the Mills College Dance Department. They first offered classes in dance to children through adults, until forming the Children's Troupe in 1980, a performing company whose members were between six and 19 years of age. The Troupe created original works, often in collaborations with adult guest artists, including choreographer and writer Remy Charlip, playwright and actor Ken Grantham, composers Ed Bogas, Randy Craig, Meredith Monk, Carman Moore and Keith Terry, landscape architect John Roberts, and writer Ishmael Reed. Until 1992, with help from local foundation and government grants, these works were performed in schools, museums, theaters, libraries, parks, shopping malls, senior centers, and community arts centers and festivals. The works incorporated movement (folk dance, modern dance, ballet, and social dance forms) and theater forms (from traditional forms like Mummers Plays, shadow plays, mime, puppetry, and scripts to cutting-edge performance art techniques), their repertoire including "Horse Ballet", whose dance score adhered to the style of equestrian pageants popular in the palace courts of 17th-century Europe.
Based upon her experiences of teaching and directing young artists, Blank co-authored a performance arts handbook, "Live On Stage!", with Jody Roberts (1997 and 2000, Dale Seymour Publications). It is intended to help classroom teachers integrate arts into their basic curriculum, offering an ecumenical approach that mixes performing arts traditions from around the world, making cross-disciplinary connections and generally expanding concepts of theater training to include traditional and experimental techniques, while still fulfilling the guidelines of the National Standards for Arts Education. The anthology received statewide adoptions for middle-school use in North Carolina, Tennessee, Mississippi and Idaho, and has been referenced in various school districts’ curriculum guides in the U.S. and Canada, including the Yale-New Haven Teacher’s Institute and the Cambridge Public School Drama Collaborative, developed with Harvard University’s Office of the Arts.
Writing and editing.
Blank has written or been the editor of several other books, including in 2003 "Rediscovering America: The Making of Multicultural America, 1900-2000", which "explores the lost history of America, highlighting and reintegrating the complex contributions of women, African, Asian, Hispanic, and Native Americans, immigrants, artists, renegades, rebels, rogues, and others normally cast to the margins of history books, but without whom there is no honest accounting of American history." Among her other published titles are "Storming the Old Boys' Citadel: Two Pioneer Women Architects of Nineteenth Century North America" (Baraka Books, 2014), co-authored with architectural historian Tania Martin, which chronicles the careers of Louise Blanchard Bethune and Mother Joseph du Sacré-Coeur – a work about which "The Montreal Review of Books" said: "Books like this one are vital in highlighting what our history notes have left out. They remind us to redefine our views and question our records. If we need to redefine the history of architecture today, let it include women."
Anthologies that Blank has co-edited with Ishmael Reed include "Bigotry on Broadway" , forthcoming from Baraka Books of Montreal in September 2021, and "PowWow: Charting the Fault Lines in the American Experience, Short Fiction, From Then to Now" (2009), described by the "Los Angeles Times" as "big, diverse, messy, all over the place -- just like American literature itself." According to "Publishers Weekly", it is "a captivating, multifarious look at the American experience through its short fiction", while "January Magazine" called it "an important book ... a collection intended to mark our consciousness and our hearts."
Over the years she has been a contributor to such publications as "CounterPunch", "El País", "The Green Magazine", "Hungry Mind Review", "The Wall Street Journal", "San Francisco Chronicle", "Alta", and "Konch Magazine".
Ishmael Reed Publishing.
As editorial director of Ishmael Reed Publishing she has had charge of poetry and prose projects including "25 New Nigerian Poets" (2000, edited by Toyin Adewale) and "Short Stories by 16 Nigerian Women" (2003, edited by Toyin Adewale-Gabriel), which have both been translated into Arabic by the National Center for Translation, in Egypt. Other titles Blank has supervised include "Black Girl from Tannery Flats" (2003), the memoir of her mother-in-law, Thelma V. Reed; "New and Collected Poems" by Kathryn Takara (2003), poetry collections from four women poets based in northern California: "Under Burning White Sky" (2005) by Boadiba, "Swallowing Watermelons" by Karla Brundage (2006), "City Beautiful" by Tennessee Reed (2006), and "After Altamira" by Neli Moody (2006); and "Maggie 3", a novel by Alison Mills Newman (2007). In 2011 the press published "New and Selected Yuri", a collection of poetry and fiction by Japan-based writer Yuri Kageyama; in 2013 a new collection of poetry, "Paper Gods and Rebels", by San Francisco-based writer Genny Lim; and in 2015 and 2017 published the first and second collections of poetry by Alaska-based Tlingit/Iñupiaq writer Ishmael Hope, "Courtesans of Flounder Hill" and "Rock Piles Along the Eddy". In 2018 the press released "King Comus", a formerly unpublished novel by the late William Demby, which the "HuffPost" designated "Rediscovered Novel of the Year".
Personal life.
Blank has been married since 1970 to Ishmael Reed, whom she met in 1965. She has worked with Reed on a range of projects and books, in addition to her independent career. With Reed in the roles of jazz pianist and bandleader, she plays violin in the Ishmael Reed Quintet, having begun studying the violin as a child, in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, with Mihail Stolarevsky, making her recording debut on the CD "For All We Know". She lives in Oakland, California, with her husband and their daughter, Tennessee Reed, who is also a writer.