By Alex Thompson  

Ballet and Engineering

Born in 1933, Judith Love Cohen set out from an early age to do things girls were simply not expected to do at that time. She had a deep passion for maths and was very good at it, to the point where her fellow classmates would pay her to do their homework for them. As she grew up Cohen realised she was more interested in engineering and studied at college whilst also performing in New York’s Metropolitan Opera Ballet company.

Though this may seem an odd mix but Cohen was used to being unique – as she went through school, she had noticed that she was the only girl in the majority of her maths classes. This continued when she went to study at the University of South California, completing both her Bachelor of Science and Master of Science courses without ever seeing another female engineer. She studied at night whilst working in the day as a junior engineer for North American Aviation. Upon joining NASA, she was one of only a handful of female engineers employed by the space agency at the time. Not that this discouraged her. She later remarked “I had already figured out that I was going to do things that no [other girls] ever did.”

Project Apollo

Cohen worked on many of the first spacecraft in America’s space programme, including Pioneer, where she worked with her first husband, Bud. However, she considered her greatest achievement to be her work on the Apollo missions. Her most important engineering feat was her contribution to the Lunar Module’s Abort Guidance System, which played a critical role in the safe return of the Apollo 13 astronauts after an oxygen tank exploded on their way to the Moon. The return of the astronauts alive and well is considered one of the most incredible moments in the history of human spaceflight and Cohen was present when the astronauts paid their thanks to the TRW facility for their crucial role in their return.

A Star is Born

It was whilst working on the Abort Guidance System that the story that went viral took place. At the time of the first Moon landings in July 1969, Cohen was already eight months pregnant with her fourth child. On one particular day the following month Cohen came into work as usual when her waters broke. On her way out of the door she grabbed a printout of a problem she’d been working on and continued to work on it whilst in labour. According to another of her children, Neil Siegel, she phoned her boss later that day and “told him she had solved the problem. And… oh yes, the baby was born, too.” The child she gave both to that day was future School of Rock and Jumanji star Jack Black.

Yes really.

Engineer to Author

Cohen continued to work at NASA throughout the 1970s and 80s, working with then-husband (and Black’s dad) Tom as satellite engineers on the Hubble Space Telescope.

Cohen retired as an engineer in 1990 and set up a publishing company Cascade Pass with new husband David Katz. She wrote and published a series of books called “You Can be a Woman….”, which was aimed at young girls and encouraged them to follow various careers in science, with David illustrating. They also published another series that encouraged younger children to practice environmentally friendly exercises called “Green”, and a book named “The Women of Apollo” which featured four biographies of women who had helped put humans on the Moon, including Cohen herself.

Legacy

Judith Love Cohen is much more than an interesting anecdote. She was a mathematician, a dancer, a publisher, a highly talented engineer and an advocate for women in the workplace. Some of the practices we take for granted today, such as internal listings of jobs in companies and formal descriptions for every vacant position, were Cohen’s ideas, with the main purpose being to encourage more women to apply. Upon her passing in 2016, Siegel wrote “she must have influenced tens of thousands of young girls to become interested in professional careers of one sort or another.”

And that is the true legacy of Judith Love Cohen.

About the author: Alex Thompson is a Space Communications Presenter at the National Space Centre.

 

 

Focusing on the struggles, achievements, and courage of those with disabilities during Disability Pride Month.

By Brianna Letendre

 

What a remarkable, young woman.  Hers will be a name we will hear more about as the years go by.  We must do all that we can to protect our democracy so that young people like Dasia can get the knowledge to make the world a better place.

For more stories of remarkable women, see HERSTORY on womensvoicesmedia.org

In a 1912 New York Times article, Mabel Ping-Hua Lee was regarded as “the symbol of the new era, when all women will be free and unhampered.”[1] At the time, sixteen year old Lee was already a recognized suffragist and activist that would help to lead almost 10,000 people in the New York suffrage parade. Lee went on to become the first Chinese woman to get a PhD in economics.

Mabel Ping-Hua Lee was born on October 7, 1897 in Guangzhou (Canton City), China. Her father, Dr. Lee Towe, was a missionary pastor and he moved to the United States when she was four years old. Lee stayed in China with her mother and grandmother, and she studied Chinese  from private tutors. When Lee was nine years old, she won an academic scholarship called the Boxer Indemnity Scholarship that allowed her to relocate to the United States to attend school. The Lee family moved in 1905 to Chinatown in New York City, and Mabel Lee attended Erasmus Hall Academy in Brooklyn, New York. Lee became involved in activism and women’s rights very early on. By the time she was sixteen years old, Lee helped to lead a suffrage parade on horseback in New York City. Held on May 4, 1912, the parade started in New York’s historic Greenwich Village and was attended by almost ten thousand people.

Prior to the parade, the New York Tribune and New York Times wrote articles featuring Lee’s teenage activism and her involvement in the movement. Ironically, the 1882 Chinese Exclusion Act prevented Chinese immigrants from attaining citizenship and voting. Even when the 19^th amendment was passed, Chinese women and many other women of color still did not have the ability to vote. However, Lee still strongly advocated for suffrage for women. In addition to her activism for women’s rights, Lee was also a brilliant student. While in school, she excelled in English, Latin, and mathematics. At sixteen years old she was admitted to Barnard College, the women’s college connected to the all-male Columbia University. Lee majored in history and philosophy and joined the Chinese Students’ Association. She continued her activism by writing feminist essays for The Chinese Students’ Monthly. She wrote an essay in 1914 entitled “The Meaning of Woman Suffrage,” that emphasized the importance of extending voting rights and equal opportunities to women. Two years later, Lee gave a speech at the Women’s Political Union’s Suffrage Shop entitled “The Submerged Half.” In this speech, Lee encouraged the education and civic participation of Chinese women of all ages.

By 1917, women in the state of New York were granted the right to vote. Three years later, the 19^th Amendment was passed that gave women the right to vote across the country. However, Lee and many other women of color still could not vote. It would take another almost twenty-five years for Lee to be granted the right to vote with the repeal of the Chinese Exclusion Act in 1943. However, she continued to advocate for women’s suffrage and equal rights. Lee graduated from Barnard College and went on to receive her master’s degree in educational administration from Columbia Teacher’s College. She decided to continue her studies and attended Columbia University to pursue a PhD in economics. While in graduate school, Lee studied under well-known economic professors including; Edwin R. A. Seligman, Henry R. Seager, Henry L. Moore, Vladimir G. Simkhovitch, Wesley C. Mitchell, and Robert E. Chaddock. She graduated in 1921 and became the first Chinese woman to graduate with a PhD in economics. That year, Lee published her PhD research as a book entitled The Economic History of China. Unfortunately, Lee’s father passed away in 1924, a few years after her graduation.

After her father’s death, Lee took over his role as director of the First Chinese Baptist Church of New York City. She also opened a community center called the Chinese Christian Center. This center was designed to empower the Chinese community by offering a health clinic, a kindergarten, vocational training, and English classes. Mabel Ping-Hua Lee died in 1966 at the age of 70. It is unknown if Lee ever attained United States citizenship and exercised her right to vote, but her activism ensured many other women had the ability to do so.

AUTHORS:

MLA – Alexander, Kerri Lee. “Mabel Ping-Hua Lee.” National Women’s History Museum, 2020. Date accessed.

Chicago – Alexander, Kerri Lee. “Mabel Ping-Hua Lee.” National Women’s History Museum. 2020. www.womenshistory.org/education-resources/biographies/mabel-ping-hua-lee.

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