Herstory

Herstory

Did you think we were done with the celebration of history months? Not at all, boy! Black History month may have ended, but now we have Female History Month to work with. Wait, you're probably not aware that there's a HERstory month.

Yeah, I know! You're shocked. You really didn't know there was a women's history month in America. Though I guess that just makes me more depressed thinking about it. But I thought that you all should know about it. I also have to admit that I feel a little weird about making this post about it. You know, being a person with a penis and all. But it's women's history month and you really should be aware of that.

So how about we get started with some history on women's history?

Women's History Month had its origins as a national celebration in 1981 when congress passed Pub. L. 97-28, which authorized and requested the President to proclaim the week beginning March 7, 1982 as "Women's History Week." Throughout the next five years, Congres continued to pass joint resolutions designating a week in March as "Women's History Week." In 1987 after being petitioned by the national Women's History Project, Congress passed Pub. L. 100-9 which designated the month of March 1987 as "Women's History Month." Between 1988 and 1994, Congress passed additional resolutions requesting the authorizing the President to proclaim March of each year as Women's History Month. Since 1995, Presidents Clinton, Bush and Obama have issued a series of annual proclamations designating the month of March as "Women's History Month."

Consider yourself Herstorified. Yes, you sir, are being slowly turned into a feminist.



Don't think of it as a bad thing. I mean, let's face it - this is a good thing. This just means that you can get closer and closer to breaking that glass ceiling sometime in our life time. It's bad enough that women are regulated to behind the scenes. Can you, for example, name your favorite female film maker?

"The Herstory of the Female Filmmaker" by Kelly Gallagher from Kelly Gallagher on Vimeo.

I figured not. I would highly recommend that you visit this month at various points, this Tumblr page. I don't recommend Tumblr's very often because as a blogger, it is sort of lazy sharing. But Cool Chicks From History is well worth checking out.

So what will I leave you with? Well, how about a little Herstory in the form of Myra Belle Starr?

Over the next several years Belle Starr would continue to find herself arrested for charges of robbery, however, Judge Parker would be forced to release her for lack of evidence. A particularly memorable such arrest was in 1886, when Belle was charged with robbing a post office while dressed as a man. That same year Sam Starr was killed by a longtime family nemesis. Shortly afterward Belle provided the legal counsel for Bluford "Blue" Duck, a Cherokee Indian indicted for murdering a farm hand. To Judge Parker's ire, the death sentence he imposed was commuted to life imprisonment. And in 1888, when her son Ed was arrested for horse theft, her lawyers contacted President Grover Cleveland, who overturned Judge Parker's seven-year prison sentence with a full pardon.

Rock on, woman! She basically said "Fuck the police" She and me is blood from way back when, boo.