October 20

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Women peacemakers born today

  • 1873 Frances Alice Kellor born Columbus, OH (d. 1952). Internationalist; progressive reformer; expert on conflict resolution; Code of International Arbitration, 1931; advocate for the outlawing of war; founded National League for Protection of Colored Women, 1906; advocate for immigrants' rights.

  • 1873 Nellie Letitia McClung born Chatsworth, Ontario, Canada (d. 1951). Canadian suffragist; novelist; legislator; delegate to League of Nations, 1938.

  • 1886 Florence Brewer Boeckel born Trenton, NJ (d. 1965). Suffragist; Director of National Center for Prevention of War; prolific writer on peace and international organizations; handbook on peacemaking, 1928; delegate to the World Peace Congress in Brussels, 1936.

  • 1920 Janet Rosenberg Jagan born Chicago, IL. Socialist; jailed for Guyana's independence, 1954; UN delegate 1993; awarded Gandhi Peace Prize, 2003; first female president of Guyana, 1997.

  • 1926 Dorothy Rupert born Meadow Grove, NE. Colorado legislator, 1986-2001; legislated against female genital mutilation. Active in WAND and WILPF, opposing Vietnam War and nuclear weapons; Nobel Peace Prize nominee, 2005.

  • 1947 Patricia Verdugo born Santiago, Chile (d. 2008). Journalist and author of 10 books chronicling Pinochet’s human rights abuses. Co-founded magazine Hoy (“Today”), critical of the ruling dictatorship, 1977. Co-founded the Women's Movement for Life, protesting human rights abuses, 1983. Nobel Peace Prize nominee, 2005.

  • 1964 Karen Tse born Cleveland, OH. International human rights lawyer; UN Judicial Mentor to Cambodia, 1994; founded International Bridges to Justice, 2000.

Women's peacemaking on this day

  • 1917 Alice Paul began serving a seven-month sentence at Occoquan Prison.

  • 1965 Helen Chavez arrested for unlawful assembly in civil disobedience of farm workers protest, Delano, CA.

  • 1989 Donna Lee Hirsch arrested for civil disobedience in protest against Trident II nukes, West Valley, UT.

  • 1990 Stephanie Atkinson refused call to reserves in Gulf War, New York.

  • 1999 Greenock Judge Margaret Gimblett acquitted three women for damage to Trident sub lab, Loch Gail.