Local branch celebrates 40 years of promoting women’s rights and
raising awareness of women’s issues
Gilroy – Nurse or teacher.
Those were the two pre-approved career paths for women only 50 years ago.
But the times have changed.
Consider this: Gilroy’s branch of the American Association of University Women will celebrate it’s 40th year anniversary tonight. Only 100 years ago to the month Susan B. Anthony was on her deathbed after a lifetime’s worth of struggle to attain equal pay, as well as property and voting rights for women. Even after her death women weren’t allowed to vote for another 14 years.
For club members to say “we’ve come a long way, baby” might just qualify as the understatement of the century.
Members of the AAUW have lived the changes that their mothers and grandmothers fought to acquire, perhaps one the biggest being the right and the means to an education.
The American Association of University Women traces its roots back to 1881 in Boston when a group of 17 like-minded university graduates got together to find ways to put their training to good use and open up education opportunities to other women. By society’s standards at the time, it was an unusual goal.
“There were hardly any women who were college graduates then,” noted Gilroy AAUW member Connie Rogers.
Obviously, at the bulls-eye of the club’s goals over the past century has been equity in education. With more than 10,000 AAUW members nationwide and women attending college in larger numbers than men since the 1980s, it’s safe to say significant progress has been made toward that goal.
As the daughters of mothers who had a healthy respect for the power of education, many of the members of Gilroy’s AAUW were college bound hardly of their own volition.
“I didn’t have a choice. My mother started saving for me (to go to college) when I was 5 years old,” said club member Margie Enger.
Enger’s mother’s philosophy ran rife with the hard bought common sense of a woman who had seen firsthand the economic security of education affords: “You never know, you have to be independent, what are you going to do to support your family?” Enger remembers her saying.
Many AAUW members remember being aware that it was simply expected of them that they would go to college.
“(College) was the expected path,” said AAUW member Esther Forman.
With their parent’s expectations having set a predetermined course for many Gilroy AAUW members there was nothing to it, off to college they went. Today Gilroy AAUW members hail from colleges as diverse as the University of the Pacific (Carol Smith), the University of Vermont (Connie Rogers), and George Fox University (Jan Paterson).
Today the AAUW works on a national scale to advocate education at all levels. The organization also combats domestic abuse, advocates equal pay for women, and fights to raise awareness on women’s issues.
Looking back over 40 years of club history AAUW members say they can see how the club has had a shaping influence on the lives of women in Gilroy, who have then gone and shaped Gilroy itself.
“We’ve done some darn important things over 40 years,” said Rogers.
In 1977 AAUW members did a study on Uvas Creek, the result of which was the creation of the 125 acre Uvas Park Preserve.
“(At the time) it was managed by eight different agencies and no one was protecting it,” said Rogers. “If that study hadn’t been done the city might not have had the creek preserved.”
Besides shaping the city’s landscape, Gilroy’s AAUW has significantly shaped it’s politics as well. In 1978 the club formed a focus group called Women as Agents of Change.
“(At that time) none of the city committees had women in them and no women were on the city council,” said Rogers. The AAUW began an effort to get women into appointed positions throughout the city. The fruit of their efforts was that AAUW president Roberta Hughan successfully ran for city council and later for mayor, with many women following her lead into positions of leadership throughout the city.
“We need more women in those kinds of positions,” Rogers commented. “Women think differently from men, you need both.”
Gilroy’s AAUW has also had it’s hand in keeping the library from drastically reducing it’s numbers of hours by advocating the renewal of the parcel tax and voter registration projects.
In addition, the club provides two college scholarships annually, one at Gilroy High and one at Gavilan for a woman re-entering college.
And while their experiences have been diverse, the women of Gilroy’s AAUW are tied together by one thing: the experience of going to college. And even 125 years into the club’s history – 40 years into it’s presence in Gilroy – they are still committed to opening the doors of education to women. And they do it with passion because they have each come to discover for themselves that going to college offers something that can’t be found anywhere else.
“It offers a different perspective, if you don’t experience it then you just never have that perspective,” said Enger.
Celebrate 40 Years
– Gilroy’s AAUW will celebrate its 40th anniversary at a dinner held at the Presbyterian Church Social Hill at 6pm tonight.
– Roberta Hughan, Gilroy’s first woman council member, first mayor, first AAUW Gilroy Branch president and one of Gilroy’s AAUW founding members will be the guest speaker.
– Details: Margie Enger at 842-9996 or Esther Forman 847-2856.
