Edith Terry Bremer

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Overview

Edith Terry Bremer born Hamilton, NY October 9, 1885 (d. 1964). Immigration expert; founded International Institute, a movement for cultural pluralism with efforts towards protection of immigrant girls, 1910. (photo Quillen's Cues to Community Organizing)

Quotations

On the Americanization Movement: “There was ignorance in it; there was the arrogant assumption that everything American was intrinsically superior to anything foreign. There was fear in it. There were the germs of hate in it. None of these things make for anything but a sharp division, a deeper separation between peoples.” (C. Ullman, “The Connections among Immigration, Nation Building”, Adult Learning, 2010, p. 6, in arbrown.wordpress.com; photo facebook.com)

Beatrice Brigden

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Overview

Beatrice Brigden born Belleville, Ontario, Canada January 20, 1888 (d. 1977). Radical Canadian social reformer; peace activist; Socialist feminist; daughter of Quaker mother, she became a Quaker after WWII; critic of Methodist church support for war following WWI; delegate to First Interamerican Congress of Women, Guatemala 1947 which opposed nuclear weapons and asked for pacifist women at UN; Voice of Women (VOW) peace mission to USSR 1963; first women to seek federal office, frequently defeated.

Quotations

"[M]en won't run where there is no chance, while women are willing to run for principle." (brandon.com, Jan. 30, 2012; photo Wikipedia)

Anna Cox Brinton

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Overview

Anna Cox Brinton born San Jose, CA October 19, 1887 (d. 1969). Quaker pacifist; AFSC Commissioner for Asia, 1946; AFSC International Program director. (Photo 1920 Imogen Cunningham)

Quotations

“The blight on American character today is hardness of heart. We older people could, if we would, do something about it. We could help to train conscience.
Why are Americans believed to be cruel? For two very visible reasons: (l) We are the only nation that has used the atomic bomb, and we do not hesitate to prepare for full-scale nuclear war. (2) We are thought to be cruel to our little children. Thousands of American families,military and civilian, are living abroad. Soft-spoken foreign people hear American mothers talk unpolitely, and often in a loud voice, to their toddlers. They even threaten them.” (Friends Journal, Aug. 23, 1958, p. 481; photo 1920 Imogen Cunningham)

Ellen Starr Brinton

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Overview

Ellen Starr Brinton born West Chester, PA March 16, 1886 (d. 1954). Quaker; internationalist; feminist; early leader of WILPF. Founded Swarthmore Peace Collection, 1935.

Quotations

“We cannot see how to make a division between her [Jane Addams's] interest in peace and her interest in other subjects, as her whole life was devoted to various causes, all of them connected with friendship and good will toward all people, and this is the basis of the Peace Movement.” (Apr. 19, 1940 to Eliz. Allen; photo Swarthmore peace col.)

Jo Bristah

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Overview

Jo Bristah (née Emily Josip) born Moulmein, Burma March 7, 1924 (d. 2011). Daughter of missionaries. Founded the second American peace studio, the Swords into Plowshares (SIP) Peace Center, Detroit, 1985.

Quotations

"The arts reach people's emotions and attract some people not previously relating their lives to peace work. . . Art requires the artist to take a 'creative initiative,' which each person must do in her or his own way in working for peace and justice." (War Resisters League 1991 Peace Calendar, June 16; photo obits.mlive.com)

Rita Nakashima Brock

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Overview

Rita Nakashima Brock born Fukuoka, Kyushu, Japan April 29, 1950. American theologian; daughter of American soldier who served in Korean War. First Asian-American woman doctor of theology. Presided over Truth Commission on Conscience in War, 2010; founding co-director of Soul Repair Center at Brite Divinity School dealing with trauma of war, 2012. Opposed Iraq and Afghan wars.

Quotations

“Regardless of our personal positions on a war, a society that engaged in warfare must come to terms with its responsibilities for its effects and with its own moral injury.” (Huffington Post, Jan. 7, 2015; photo umcnic.org)

Marion Bromley

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Overview

Marion Bromley (née Coddington) born Akron, OH October 10, 1912 (d. 1996). Quaker pacifist; pioneering war tax resister; founder of CORE, 1941; founder of Peacemakers, 1948; first Freedom Ride, 1947; arrested in New York Easter parade, 1947.

Quotations

"Decide that you're not going to pay, and then figure how to do it." (Cincinnati Mag. June 1987; photo c. 1982 Swarth. Peace Col.)

Gwendolyn Brooks

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Overview

Gwendolyn Brooks born Topeka, KS June 7, 1917 (d. 2000). Poet, first Black Pulitzer Prize winner; early antiwar poems after World War II, linking war to racism.

Quotations

He had come down, He said, to clean the earth
Of the dirtiness of war.
Now tell of why His power failed Him there?
His power did not fail. It was that, simply,
He found how much the people wanted war.

("In Emanuel's Nightmare")

Gertrude Foster Brown

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Overview

Gertrude Foster Brown born Morrison, IL January 29, 1867 (d. 1956). Concert pianist; suffragist; editor; active promoter of League of Nations; representative of Women's Action Committee for Victory and Lasting Peace at UN founding San Francisco, 1945.

Quotations

"The protection and care of human life has always been woman's great business in life." (Your Vote, 1918, pref.; photo http://bit.ly/GJHCEf)

Rosemary Brown

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Overview

Rosemary Brown (née Wedderburn) born Kingston, Jamaica June 17, 1930 (d. 2003). Canadian Black human rights leader, first Black in provincial legislature, served 15 years 1972-86; professor of women's studies; Chief of Ontario Human Rights Commission; early member of pacifist Voice of Women.

Quotations

"Unless all of us are free, none of us will be free. . . Until all of us have made it, none of us have made it." (photo collectionscanada.gc.ca)

Antoinette Brown Blackwell

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Overview

Antoinette Louisa Brown Blackwell born Henrietta, NY May 20, 1825 (d. 1921). Feminist, abolitionist, suffrage orator; author of books on science and philosophy; first woman Congregational Minister; mobbed at World's Temperance Convention 1843.

Quotations

"The struggle for existence is but a perfected system of cooperations in which all sentient and unsentient forces mutually co-work in securing the highest ultimate for good." (Studies in General Science, 1869; photo Unit.-Universalists)

Minnijean Brown-Trickey

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Overview

Minnijean Brown-Trickey born Little Rock, AR September 11, 1941. Civil rights activist. At age 16 one of Little Rock Nine who desegregated Central High School; expelled for calling girl "white trash" who hit her with her purse, and spilling chili onto floor in front of harassing boys; exiled during Vietnam War to Canada where she supported First Nation issues; Interior Dept. Deputy Assistant Secretary for Diversity under Clinton 1999-2001; Congressional Gold Medal 1999.

Quotations

"The general feeling was if she [Rosa Parks] could do it, we could do it. . . She was really a heroine to us. She was an ordinary woman and we were ordinary kids and it seems we had a relationship." ("Little Rock Nine member calls Parks an inspiration", Associated Press, Oct. 26, 2005; photo thirteen.org)

Carrie Brownstein

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Overview

Carrie Brownstein born Redmond, WA September 27, 1974. Antiwar guitarist.

Quotations

On Iraq war: "[T]he goal of this rhetoric is so that people will forget what we are actually doing over there. No one wants to think about the fact that people are dying." (March 3, 2004)

The good old boys are back on top again
And if we let them lead us blindly
The past becomes the future once again

("Combat Rock" 2003)

Janet Bruin

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Overview

Janet Bruin born Philadelphia, PA January 23, 1945 (d. 1996). Swiss-American; second generation WILPF member; editor of WILPF publication Pax et Libertas.

Quotations

"[WILPF is] a remarkable organization. . . a real tribute to women—to our vision, to our stubbornness, and our love." (Women for All Seasons, p. 171).

"I'm in the peace movement because I love life. I refuse to sit back and let this precious planet be destroyed." ("Black Movements," WILPF, Sept. 1985)