Clara Belle Drisdale Williams (1885-1993), was the first African-American man or woman to graduate from New Mexico State University ~ among many other accomplishments…
After graduating at the top of her class in 1905 from the Prairie View Normal and Independent College in Texas, Williams went on to study at the University of Chicago, where she met her future husband, Jasper Williams. They married in 1917.
In New Mexico, where she resumed her studies after having three sons (all of whom went on to pursue degrees in medicine) Willams was denied entry into the classroom by several of her (need I say racist, oh why not?!) instructors, forcing her to take notes from the hallway. Additionally, she was prohibited from accompanying her class to receive her diploma again because racism, to which we can add a full dollop of misogynoir.
Despite these and other barriers to her success, Williams became a respected teacher of black students over many years in both segregated and desecrated schools. Early in her long career, Williams’ students included the parents of those she taught by day, many of whom were former slaves, serving these individuals with night instruction.
In 1961, New Mexico State University named a street on its campus after Williams; in 2005 the building of the English department was renamed Clara Belle Williams Hall. In 1980 Williams was awarded an honorary doctorate of laws degree by NMSU, which also apologized for the treatment she was subjected to as a student. She died at 107 years old.
In order to write about Black History month, I started down a rabbit hole that took me around and about all over the place, landing at one point on the phenomenal, amazing, admirable, extraordinary Betty Bloomer, who became Betty Warren, and still later (after her divorce from husband numero uno) became Betty Ford.
As Betty Bloomer, she left Michigan to work as a model and dancer in New York City, where she was good enough to be accepted into and dance with the Martha Graham Company, including a performance at Carnegie Hall. Still, her mother was worried and Betty returned to Michigan where – if she really, really wanted to return to NYC in six months – she was promised she could, with full support. Life intervened, however, and the rest is, as they say, history. Literally.
Betty Ford. The rabbit hole leading me to this fascinating human began because her husband, then President Gerald Ford, recognized Black History month for the first time, in 1976. Ford, by the way (history nerd alert!!), was the only president in U.S. history to occupy the vice-presidency and the presidency without having been elected to either job. Betty Ford. The wife of a Republican, Betty Ford was adamantly and openly pro-choice, pro-ERA, pro-gender equity. She once ran a dance school (hello, so cool!), speaking openly about her addiction issues – and those of her family – and she was transparently honest about her breast cancer diagnosis while in the White House, raising awareness and changing the conversation around women’s health and that specific issue forever, and for the better.
She founded the Betty Ford Center, where addicts of all kinds get treatment to this day, and Betty Bloomer Warren Ford was also, post-First-Lady-hood (?) involved with numerous HIV/AIDs causes. Go Betty.
Her feminism came from watching her mother struggle to find and keep work, raising three children after Betty’s father died at age fifty-nine, possibly of suicide. It was also informed by her own struggle for independence after marrying young to a man who, it quickly became apparent, was an alcoholic, and whose alcoholism and diabetes put him in a coma just as she was petitioning for a divorce. She got one, after working and waiting several years (living upstairs in her soon to be ex-in-laws house, must’ve been a blast!), meeting Gerald Ford in 1947, about a month before her divorce was final, marrying the future president in ’48.
She was famously candid about her life, and her opinions, very different from the strictly buttoned lips of Lady Bird and (poor) Pat Nixon. Her candor about all aspects of her life helped others, and – via the Betty Ford Center – still does today.
*This flock of turkeys used to cross my lawn on a regular basis, to my joy. Diego’s noisy presence has them crossing at a point well above the house where, occasionally, I can catch them if I happen to look out my windows as they’re making their move…I find them and all of nature beautiful and amazing (with the exception of TICKS). In some Native American cultures turkeys represent abundance, the tradition of sharing all gifts, the gift eagle. Benjamin Franklin wanted the turkey to be our national bird in the U.S. ~ a very different symbol, don’t you think?
Diego. He’s so stinking gorgeous-juss that sometimes I cannot stand it! Here he is in all of his canine glory, such a good boi, and yes, that’s his couch, in case you were wondering, his mother having surrendered it ages ago. And that’s fine, too. Lately he’s been a particularly good boi, largely because his mother – after two solid months of holiday overeating – has straightened up, and stopped being such a nag. In other words, he wasn’t ever a bad boi, his mother was overreacting and high*crash*low on one of the worst drugs out there: sugar. Right now he’s outside barking at a truck parked up the road, someone looking for ? something to hunt, or checking traps, perhaps? Rural living! Diego is very protective of the entire road, and – thank goodness – safely contained within my invisible fence, a game changer for which I am deeply, deeply grateful. Sweet boi.
*The lack of research and understanding of ‘lady parts’ or ‘lady bits’ is staggering. Cat Bohannon is one of many women leading the way our of the dark, into the necessary light, for women.
Twenty-eight+ minutes of so much good info – cannot love this or pass it along enough, from the folks at Crooked Media, the podcast Hysteria, of which I am a devoted follower:
My favorite quote from this interview (altho I love it all): “because if giving birth is dangerous, then you want to do it under ideal circumstances.” A-WOMEN.
