Women 2000 - Press Release

Press Release

Worcester Women's History Project makes announcement

Announces coming event in October

Worcester, Spring 2000

On October 20-22, 2000, The Worcester Women's History Project will celebrate the 150th anniversary of the First National Woman's Rights Convention that was held in Worcester, Massachusetts in 1850. Our three-day celebration, "Women 2000," will include a one-day pre-conference at Holy Cross College for middle and high school teachers, a ninety minute play "Angels and Infidels" based on the original newspaper coverage of the 1850 convention and a contemporary women's issues conference at the Worcester Centrum Centre with keynote speakers and twenty-eight panelists and workshops, entertainment and exhibits. "Angels and Infidels," was commissioned by the Worcester Women's History Project and written by a nationally known playwright, Louisa Burns-Bisogno. A professional cast will perform it.

Some of our keynote speakers include author and former Smith College president Jill Ker Conway, United Farmworkers Union founder Dolores Huerta, Massachusetts Supreme Court Chief Justice Margaret Marshall, author and poet Marge Piercy, filmmaker Mary Mazzio, host of "Greater Boston" Emily Rooney and Grammy award-winning, Sweet Honey in the Rock. Just a few of the many institutions and organizations that will be represented are the Sophia Smith Archives at Smith College, the Schlesinger Library, the Wellesley Centers for Research on Women, the Massachusetts AFL-CIO, the Massachusetts Women's Political Caucus, the Center for Women and Public Policy, the Institute of Women and Gender of Stanford University and the Unitarian Universalist Women's Heritage Society.

The first National Women's Rights Convention was held in Worcester's Brinley Hall and it was organized by radical abolitionists and women's rights advocates. It was unprecedented in its scope. It drew delegates from 11 states and more than 1,000 participants: women and men, African-American and white. It pushed the early women's rights movement into the national and, indeed, international arenas and it is often cited as an inspiration to feminists in England, France and Germany. One of the most significant aspects of the 1850 convention, and one which set it apart from the others, was its controversial stance on human rights which proclaimed "equality before the law, without distinction of sex or color," thus linking the fight for gender equality with the struggle for racial equality.

For more information regarding registration for Women 2000, please contact Jessie Rodrique, Project Coordinator.

Worcester Women's History Project
One Salem Square
Worcester, MA 01608
Wwhp@net1plus.com