Category: "Women's Health & Reproductive Rights"

Mavra Esme Starke (July 19, 1942 – April 8, 2025)

Mavra was born in Brooklyn, NY, the daughter of Regina Vogel and Harry Steinberg. Because her parents divorced, her childhood was spent between Brooklyn and Miami Beach, Florida. Her father, a business owner, and her mother, who held a variety of jobs, were both immigrants to the United States in their teens. Mavra's family was Orthodox Jewish.

After high school she first enrolled in Brooklyn College; then attended NYU for one term. She earned her batchelors degree from Hunter in 1966; majoring in speech and theater and minoring in education. Mavra began work on her Masters in theater at Brooklyn College and took all her courses but left before writing her thesis because her thesis advisor was making advances.

Mavra was a lifelong advocate for women's rights and civil rights. She worked to create opportunities and support systems for women and families. In Brooklyn, she started a free daycare center that she successfully persuaded the City of New York to fund.

She served as President of the Morris County chapter of the National Organization for Women (NOW), where she worked to advance gender equality and support women's rights at the local level. Mavra also created and produced a local television show in New Jersey called New Directions for Women, which focused on issues affecting women and gave voice to topics often overlooked in mainstream media.

Mavra was married to Robert DeRise for 32 years; and together they raised two daughters,

Dr. Deborah Ann Turner (1950 – 2024)

Described as a fierce advocate and fighter for voting rights and women’s rights; Dr. Deborah Ann Turner, was the 20th President of the League of Women Voters - U.S. Dr. Turner had worked with her state and local chapters of the League before moving to the national organization.

Turner was elected to the League’s national board of directors in 2016, where she served on the Finance Committee and Governance Committee, and chaired the Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) Committee. As chair of the DEI Committee, Deborah and her colleagues focused on organizational culture changes to the League’s mission work, emphasizing, not only racial equity, but also intergenerational dynamics, socioeconomic differences, gender identity, and interpersonal engagement. ,

She was born in Mason City, Iowa in 1950 and graduated from Mason City High School in 1969. In 1973 she received a B.S. degree in distributed studies/ zoology, chemistry and psychology from Iowa State University. She received her MD from the University of Iowa in 1978 where she completed her Residency in OB-Gyn. She completed her fellowship in Gynecologic Oncology at MD Anderson Cancer Center in Houston, Texas. Dr. Turner became the first African-American certified by the American Board of Obstetrics and Gynecology in the specialty of gynecologic oncology.

In 2007 she received her JD from Drake University.

Dr. Turner practiced gynecologic oncology for 35 years, enhancing university programs at the University of Nebraska, the University of Iowa, and the Medical College of Wisconsin teaching residents and students. She also served the private sector, bringing her specialty to Genesis Medical Center in Davenport, IA, Mercy Cancer Center in Mason City, IA, and Mercy Medical Center in Des Moines.

In July 2015, she left active practice to become Vice President of International Programs at the Iowa-based Outreach Program. She participated in twelve medical missions to Tanzania and worked with Singida’s Medical Center, Outreach’s Children’s Feeding Centers, and Rotary International. Beginning in 2016 she became Associate Medical Director of Planned Parenthood of North Central States.

Among Dr. Turner’s numerous awards was her induction into the Iowa Women’s Hall of Fame in 2013. She received the Gertrude Rush Award from the National Bar Association in 2015 and was awarded the Louise Noun Visionary Women of the Year award from the Young Women's Resource Center Des Moines in 2018. Her most treasured award was a certificate from the Schwartz Center for Compassionate Care. In 2022, Fortune Magazine named her a "Marquis Who's Who" top professional for her work with LWV.

JUDY HUEMANN (1947-2023) : THE LIFE AND LEGACY OF "THE MOTHER" OF THE DISA

Judy Heumann was an internationally recognized advocate for the rights of disabled people. She was widely regarded as “the mother” of the Disability Rights Movement. At 18-months-old, Judy contracted polio in Brooklyn, New York and began to use a wheelchair for mobility. She was denied the right to attend school at the age of five because she was considered a "fire hazard." Later in life, Judy was denied her teaching license by the same school district. After passing her oral and written exams, she was failed on her medical exam because she could not walk. Judy sued the New York Board of Education and Judge Constance Baker Motley (the first Black female federal judge) strongly suggested the board reconsider. They did and Judy went on to become the first wheelchair user to teach in the state of New York.

In 1977, Judy was a leader in the historic 504 Sit-In in San Francisco. This 26-day protest (the longest sit-in at a federal building to date) led to Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act being signed into law. Judy was instrumental in the development and implementation of other legislation including the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act, the Americans with Disabilities Act, and the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities. These pieces of legislation have been integral in advancing the inclusion of disabled people in the US and around the world.

From 1993 to 2001, Judy served in the Clinton Administration as the Assistant Secretary for the Office of Special Education and Rehabilitative Services in the Department of Education. Judy then served as the World Bank's first Adviser on Disability and Development from 2002 to 2006. In this position, she led the World Bank's disability work to expand its knowledge and capability to work with governments and civil society on including disability in the global conversation. In 2010, President Obama appointed Judy as the first Special Advisor for International Disability Rights at the U.S. Department of State, where she served until 2017. Mayor Fenty of D.C. appointed Judy as the first Director for the Department on Disability Services, where she was responsible for the Developmental Disability Administration and the Rehabilitation Services Administration. She also was a Senior Fellow at the Ford Foundation, where she produced the white paper Road Map for Inclusion.

Judy was a founding member of the Berkeley Center for Independent Living which was the first grassroots center in the United States and helped to launch the Independent Living Movement both nationally and globally. In 1983, Judy co-founded the World Institute on Disability (WID) with Ed Roberts and Joan Leon, as one of the first global disability rights organizations founded and continually led by people with disabilities that works to fully integrate people with disabilities into the communities around them via research, policy, and consulting efforts. Throughout her life, Judy served on a number of non-profit boards, including the American Association of People with Disabilities, the Disability Rights Education and Defense Fund, Humanity and Inclusion, Human Rights Watch, United States International Council on Disability, and Save the Children.

Being Heumann: An Unrepentant Memoir of a Disability Rights Activist, written by Judy with co-author Kristen Joiner, was published by Beacon Press in 2020. Following in 2021 was the Young Adult version, Rolling Warrior. Both audiobooks are read by Ali Stroker, the first wheelchair user to perform on Broadway. After a four studio bidding war, Being Heumann’s movie adaptation will be done by Apple TV+ with producer David Permut (Hacksaw Ridge) and writer/director Sian Heder (Academy Award Winning ‘Best Picture’ CODA).

Judy is featured in Crip Camp: A Disability Revolution, the 2020 award winning, Oscar-nominated documentary film, directed by James LeBrecht and Nicole Newnham and produced by the Obama Higher Ground Production Company. She has been featured in numerous other documentaries on the history of the disability rights movement, including Lives Worth Living and the Power of 504. She delivered a TED talk in 2016, “Our Fight for Disability Rights- and Why We’re Not Done Yet”. Her story was also told on Comedy Central’s Drunk History in early 2018, in which she was portrayed by Ali Stroker. In 2020, Judy was featured on the Trevor Noah show. She also hosted an award-winning podcast called The Heumann Perspective, featuring a variety of members from the disability community.

Judy graduated from Long Island University in Brooklyn, NY in 1969 and received her Master’s in Public Health from the University of California at Berkeley in 1975. She was awarded several honorary doctorate degrees from universities across the United States including New York University, University of Pittsburgh, Middlebury College, and Smith College. She also received numerous awards including being the first recipient of the Henry B. Betts Award in recognition of efforts to significantly improve the quality of life for people with disabilities and the Max Starkloff Lifetime Achievement Award from the National Council on Independent Living.

Judy Heumann passed away on March 4th, 2023 at the age of 75. News of her passing was reported on by major outlets in the United States and around the world. Judy Heumann passed away on March 4th, 2023 at the age of 75. Stay up-to-date on projects in Judy’s honor by following Judy Heumann Legacy on Instagram and Facebook or subscribing to the Judy Heumann Newsletter.

Learn more about the life and work of Judy: https://judithheumann.com/

OPHELIA SETTLE EGYPT (1903-1984)

Medical social worker, educator, sociologist, writer, and women's rights advocate.

By ANDREW WARD

In the late 1920s, Ophelia Settle Egypt conducted some of the first and finest interviews with former slaves, setting the stage for the Works Progress Administration’s (WPA) massive project ten years later. Born Ophelia Settle February 20, 1903, she was a graduate of the University of Pennsylvania and a researcher for the black sociologist Charles Johnson at Fisk University in Nashville. Her work with Johnson led to her 1945 study, The Unwritten History of Slavery: Autobiographical Account of Negro Ex-slaves.

Over the course of her career Settle helped expose the infamous Tuskegee study of syphilis among black sharecroppers, and played a leading role in Charles Johnson’s “Shadow of the Plantation” study of the sharecropper system. As the Depression wore on, she left Fisk to assist with relief efforts in St. Louis. She accepted a scholarship from the National Association for the Prevention of Blindness to study medicine and sociology at Washington University, where, as a black woman, she was required to receive all her lessons from a tutor. She also became head of social services at a hospital in New Orleans, and five years later conducted research for James Weldon Johnson, about whom she wrote a children’s book. Egypt was a social worker in southeast Washington, D.C., and for eleven years was the director of the community’s first Planned Parenthood clinic, which was named for her in 1981.

Ophelia Egypt left a legacy for the future. In the early 1950s, Mrs. Egypt, a social worker in Southeast Washington, DC saw a problem in her community, and set out to solve it. In the neighborhood where she lived and worked, she often came in touch with impoverished mothers of large families. Many of them were hardly more than girls themselves, and they told her over and over that they felt that they had no options. They thought they’d never be able to obtain birth control information and services.

Mrs. Egypt thought otherwise. In 1956, Planned Parenthood hired her to bring family planning into her community. She did exactly that, with tireless commitment. Mrs. Egypt went door-to-door, visited in living rooms, spoke at informal neighborhood gatherings, handed out literature at public housing projects, and reached out to others in every possible way. Singlehandedly and singlemindedly, she persuaded community leaders, including clergy, that family planning was a means of empowerment that gave women and men more control over their economic condition.

In 1957, Planned Parenthood of Metropolitan Washington opened the first private family planning clinic in Southeast Washington, DC, and for 11 years, Mrs. Egypt was its director. In 1981, three years before Mrs. Egypt passed away, the clinic was named for her.

Ophelia Settle Egypt died in Washington, D.C. May 25, 1984. She was 81.

The Age of Roe: Voices from the Front Lines

Harvard Radcliffe Institute held a major public conference January 26–27, 2023, to probe the complex and unpredictable ways that Roe v. Wade and its aftermath shaped the United States and the world beyond it for nearly half a century. The existential issue of abortion—and the galvanizing impact of Roe in particular—transformed the nation’s politics and public policy and its social movement energies, as well as the operations of the courtroom and the clinic. This opening session of the conference featured speakers with a range of perspectives from the front lines of debates about abortion, birth, and birth disparities. Each told stories from their work and talked about the work of stories in their own social movement and thought leadership.

Program, Thursday, January 26, 2023

Welcome Jane Kamensky, Carl and Lily Pforzheimer Foundation Director, Arthur and Elizabeth Schlesinger Library on the History of Women in America, Harvard Radcliffe Institute, and Jonathan Trumbull Professor of American History, Harvard Faculty of Arts and Sciences 4:28 Framing Remarks Michele Bratcher Goodwin, Chancellor’s Professor of Law and founding director, Center for Biotechnology and Global Health Policy, University of California, Irvine School of Law Presentations 20:32 Renee Bracey Sherman, founder and executive director, We Testify 36:36 Catherine Davis, founder and president, The Restoration Project 48:46 Getty Israel, founder and CEO, Sisters in Birth, Inc. 1:04:48 Moderated Conversation with Speakers Moderator: Michele Bratcher Goodwin Close of Program Jane Kamensky

For information about Harvard Radcliffe Institute and its many public programs, visit https://www.radcliffe.harvard.edu/. Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/RadcliffeIns... Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/radcliffe.i... LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/radc... Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/RadInstitute

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