Woman Who Faced Amazing Challenges & Succeeded

March 29 - Today's post contributed by Alyson Beecher

Woman Who Faced Amazing Challenges & Succeeded

by Alyson Beecher

If you were asked to name a woman in history who made a significant contribution and who also had a disability of some type, who would you name? Most people would probably name Helen Keller. However, I was curious about other women who had made or were making a difference and who also had some form of a disability. So, off to Google I went.

My simple search produced some familiar names and some names that were new to me. Helen Keller was obviously on the list but so was Harriet Tubman, and Frida Kahlo. Each of these women have numerous biographies written about them in both picture book and long-form. The famous photographer, Dorothea Lange is well known for her photography but lesser known for the limp she grew up with as a result of polio when she was a child. Wilma Mankiller, Principal Chief of the Cherokee Nation, has a chapter in a picture book celebrating famous woman and her work with the Cherokee Nation, but did you know she also served in this position while having a rare form of muscular dystrophy? Really, just a chapter in a picture book?

However, I learned about some other woman who had made notable contributions to their communities and countries and yet, little were written about them.  Jhamak Ghimire who has severe cerebral palsy and considered the “Helen Keller of Nepal” has nothing written about her in the United States, except for her own work of poetry. Judy Neumann, and Harilyn Rousso have had significant careers and lives advocating for individuals with disabilities and yet despite their life's work would not be easily recognized by most teachers and children.

After serving on the Schneider Family Book Award Jury (a children’s and young adult book award committee of the American Library Association) for the past few years, I have read a lot of books featuring individuals with special needs. However, in the category for young children, with the exception of books about Helen Keller, there were no books portraying the lives of any of these other amazing woman and the work that they have done while also living with additional challenges. Do we have a book gap? I would certainly say yes.

Though this is not a comprehensive list by any means, I would like to highlight the lives of just a few of the incredible woman who embody the spirit and essence that surrounds Women’s History Month and who are also powerful role models for our young readers who may be empowered to dream beyond their special needs because of these amazing women.

Moses: When Harriet Tubman Led Her People to Freedom by Carole Boston Weatherford; Illustrated by Kadir Nelson

Despite what I had read on Harriet Tubman in the past, it had primarily focused on her leadership and active role in assisting slaves to escape to freedom. Somehow, I had missed the fact that Tubman suffered from epilepsy along with severe headaches and narcolepsy as a result of a head injury she suffered when she was young at the hands of another slave’s overseer.

Frida by Jonah Winter; Illustrated by Ana Juan

Viva Frida by Yuyi Morales 

One of the things that have always struck me is how Frida Kahlo was able to utilize her pain and life experiences to produce so many amazing pieces of art. As a child, she contracted polio and was left with a limp, then at 18 she was in a serious bus accident, which left her in chronic pain. Kahlo lived a colorful live with her marriage to artist Diego Rivera and her political activism.

Dorothea Lange by Mike Venezia

As a child, Dorothea Lange contracted polio which left her with a limp due to a weakened right leg and foot. However, she did not let this or later health issues impede her work as a photographer and publisher. It was her goal to use her photography to bring attention to injustices, which she hoped would result in a change of action in people. Her depression era photography of rural hardship became her best known work.

Amelia to Zora: Twenty-six Women Who Changed the World by Cynthia Chin-Lee; Illustrated by Megan Halsey, Sean Addy 

Photo of Wilma Mankiller taken at the 2001 Cherokee National Holiday. Photo by Phil Konstantin

Wilma Mankiller was a lifetime activist and advocate for the rights of Native Americans and women. In 1985, she became the Principal Chief of the Cherokee Nation During her term as Principal Chief, she worked to improve health care, education and government for native americans. After a nearly fatal car crash, Mankiller was diagnosed with a form of muscular dystrophy.

Harilyn Rousso

Harilyn Rousso is not only a disability rights activist but also an activist for the rights of women with disabilities. Highly educated, Rousso has utilized her personal experiences, education, and passions to establish a number of organizations to address issues of gender and disability.

Judith Heumann, Photo from U.S. State Department

As a toddler, Judy Heumann developed polio which left her needing to use a wheelchair for the rest of her life. Heumann has spent her life advocating for the rights of those with disabilities. After college, she fought against New York State in court to be granted the right teach elementary school as an individual in a wheelchair. She later served as the Assistant Secretary of Special Education during the Clinton Administration. Currently, she works as an International Disability Rights Special Advisor advocating human rights legislation for children and adults with special needs.

"Jhamakawarded" by Madan Puraskar org . Licensed under CC BY-SA 3.0 via Wikimedia Commons http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Jhamakawarded.jpg#/media/File:Jhamakawarded.jpg

Though Jhamak Ghimire may not be able to speak or use her hands due to cerebral palsy, she has still managed to write poetry and be recognized in her native land of Nepal as an award winning poet.

Helen’s Big World: The Life of Helen Keller by Doreen Rappaport; Illustrated by Matt Tavares

Of course, I couldn’t leave out Helen Keller. Likely of the most recognized influential women who also happened to have a disability, Keller showed that despite being both blind and deaf that you can learn and you can make a difference.

What strikes me about each of these women is how hard they must have worked. Each one of these women shows us what is possible despite our personal limitations. When I think of the headaches that Harriet Tubman experienced or the chronic pain of Frida Kahlo, I am in awe. Pain is hard and yet, neither of these women allowed it to stop them from accomplishing what they were meant to do.

Mankiller, Heumann, and Rousso dedicated their lives to advocating for others. When I look at the accomplishments of these women, I almost feel like an underachiever.  They have not allowed what might be seen by others as limitations to limit them.

Lange, Kahlo, and Ghimire have used their experiences to enhance their artistic expression. Ghimire is particularly inspiring in that her own country as well as her body would have left her without a voice and yet through her writing she has found that voice.

Next time, I find myself thinking I am unable to do something, I need to remind myself how much each of these women have contributed to their communities and even the world by what they were able to accomplish while facing incredible challenges.


Alyson Beecher is an educator, book geek and literacy advocate with over 20 years of experience in education.  Currently, she is the K-8 Literacy Specialist for the Pasadena Unified School District in Pasadena, CA.  Alyson has served as the Chair of the ALA 2015 Schneider Family Book Award Jury and was an Elementary/Middle Grade Nonfiction second round judge for the CYBILS. She can be found on twitter @alybee930 or through her blog www.kidlitfrenzy.com

Nonfiction about Amazing Women

March 27 - Today's post provided by Waking Brain Cells

Nonfiction about Amazing Women

Children’s nonfiction is a great place to take a look at women who should be part of our history books but so often are overlooked and forgotten.  Here are four books that each child, girl or boy, should know about to have a more complete understanding of the role of women in history and today:

Almost Astronauts by Tanya Lee Stone

Published in 2009, Stone’s book about the Mercury 13 women won the 2010 Sibert Medal and was also nominated for a YALSA Award for Excellence in Nonfiction for Young Adults.  It is the story of women who tried to be astronauts before females were allowed in the NASA program.  It is the story of women denied their right to be astronauts despite exceeding the mastery of the men in the program.  It is the story of women of strength and character who have been forgotten by history.

Amelia to Zora: Twenty-Six Women Who Changed the World by Cynthia Chin-Lee, illustrated by Megan Halsey and Sean Addy

This 2005 title celebrates 26 women who changed the world.  Appropriate for younger children than the other books on this list, this picture book gives short pieces of information on these amazing women.  Included in the title are Amelia Earhart, Frida Kahlo, Nawal El Sadaarvi, and Zora Neale Hurston.  The women represent a wide range of ethnicities and each has a quote included as well.  The illustrations add a beauty to the book, celebrating the women in a moving way.

Lives of Extraordinary Women: Rulers, Rebels (and What the Neighbors Thought) by Kathleen Krull, illustrated by Kathryn Hewitt.

Published in 2000, Krull’s book about 20 extraordinary women in history is part of her very entertaining series on historical figures.  This book celebrates women like Cleopatra, Harriet Tubman and Eleanor Roosevelt.  Nicely, it includes women around the world.  If you like humor mixed with your nonfiction, Krull is the author for you!

With Courage and Cloth: Winning the Fight for a Woman’s Right to Vote by Ann Bausum

Published in 2004, this book is a visually powerful history of the fight for women’s right to vote in the United States.  The book follows the evolution of the suffrage movement, telling the story of the courageous women who fought for the right to vote against all odds.  It is a story of courage despite imprisonment, of the strength to protest despite derision, and of the passion for voting that so many of us have forgotten today.  These are women who should be listed with other heroes in our country and whom are often forgotten.

Editor's Note:

Authors Tanya Lee Stone, Kathleen Krull and Ann Bausum have each graciously contributed posts here this month. 

Waking Brain Cells is the new online home of longtime blogger, Tasha Saecker. If you have been wondering about her new location, wonder no more - you can find her at Waking Brain Cells.

So Many Women, So Little Time

March 7 - Today's post provided by Tanya Lee Stone

So Many Women, So Little Time

As I thought about which woman to cover in my blog post for Women’s History Month, too many flooded my consciousness. The bookshelves of my house are laden with their names: Gloria Steinem, Betty Friedan, Naomi Wolf, Amelia Earhart, Jane Addams, Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Rosalind Franklin, Judy Blume, Golda Meir, Lillian Hellman, Marge Piercy, Sojourner Truth, Ida B. Wells, and well, the list truly does go on for days. So how to pick just one? I decided not to, for it is their collective effect that has made me who I am today. Instead I would like to share my thanks for the essence of these women and many more, for the impact they created by living the truths of their lives, for the tides they turned, the boundaries they pushed, the fences they toppled.

Golda Meir

Let me begin with the woman who influenced my earliest girlhood—Golda Meir. She was the Prime Minister of Israel from 1969 to 1974. All my 9-year-old self knew about Golda Meir was how impressive it was that a woman was both leading a nation and trying to shape a vision of peace in the Middle East. That was enough to make me empty my stainless steel piggy bank and ask my parents to send her all my money.

Fast forward to college. I went to Oberlin, the first co-educational college in the United States. There I read Ayn Rand, Lillian Hellman, Marge Piercy, Rachel Carson, Annie Dillard, Virginia Woolf, Alice Walker, Lorraine Hansberry, and Toni Morrison. Outside the classroom, I learned almost by osmosis from students who threw their passions into causes and dedicated themselves to informing their fellow women (and men). Every day brought a new revelation—rallies and petitions and flyers handed to me en route to the mailroom on issues of health care rights, lesbian rights, rights for women in third world nations, oppressed women, women who needed a voice—and women who used their voices in the name of others.

I emerged from this experience with deep-held ideas about women and women’s history, and yet I still balked at the word feminist. A few years later, a dear male friend from Oberlin was visiting who, upon discovering I did not label myself a feminist, became rather annoyed with me. How is that possible with all you believe in, and why do so many women disconnect themselves from that term, he wanted to know—quite rightly. It was a valid question. It is a loaded word. And in fact, it was his supreme irritation that sparked my acute realization that I WAS, and likely had always been, a feminist. I didn’t know then that I would spend a good deal of my writing career telling stories that celebrate women’s history, but looking back, my roots are clearly visible.

Now those roots nurture the directions my own branches stretch. Sometimes it’s deep into our past with women like Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Jane Addams in the picture books I write. And sometimes it’s the not-so-distant-past with women like the “Mercury 13” who helped break down the gender boundaries in our space program and pave the way for women astronauts. Spending time with many of these women, whose story I told in Almost Astronauts: 13 Women Who Dared to Dream, illustrated the fact that women shape our world in a broad variety of ways. There is no one “type” of feminist and all who strive for change are to be celebrated.

That idea was further cemented as I sat in a room last year filled with hundreds of women, all in attendance to hear Gloria Steinem speak. At the end of her moving lecture—delivered with the ease of a confident soul—she invited anyone to come to the microphone and state her own ideas for change. As the line began to grow and weave around the back of the room, and the ideas began to flow, the realization that women make history in every community, every day, moved me to tears.

Gloria Steinem

The icing on the cake? I met Ms. Steinem afterwards and handed her a copy of Almost Astronauts. She looked at it and said, “Oh! I am so excited that you wrote this story!” I then showed her my source note citing the 1973 article about these women in her Ms. magazine. She smiled and handed me a signed copy of her book, Outrageous Acts and Everyday Rebellions. It wasn’t the torch being handed from one woman to another—it was the acknowledgement that we are all in this feminism and women’s history work together.

I know I am not alone in the fact that many, many women helped shape my own ideals—just as many, many women helped shape theirs. It is this far-reaching, intimate, and intricate sisterhood of the world that I am both fascinated by and grateful for—and so I say to all of you, Happy Women’s History Month!

Editor's Note:

Tanya Lee Stone studied English at Oberlin College and was an editor of children's nonfiction for many years. She also has a Masters Degree.
After many years as an editor, Tanya moved to Vermont and returned to writing. This award-winning author has written titles that include the young adult novel, A Bad Boy Can Be Good for a Girl (Wendy Lamb/Random House), Up Close: Ella Fitzgerald (Viking),  picture books Elizabeth Leads the Way (Holt, April 08), Sandy's Circus (Viking, Sept 08), Almost Astronauts: 13 Women Who Dared to Dream (Candlewick 09), and The Good, the Bad, and the Barbie (Viking 2010). Forthcoming titles include Who Says Women Can't Be Doctors?! (Holt) and Courage Has No Color (Candlewick).

Tanya Lee Stone blogs at http://tanyaleestone.livejournal.com/

Toddler In Peril Becomes A Leader Of Her Tribe and Book Giveaway!

MARCH 6 Today's post provided by Jan Godown Annino

Toddler In Peril Becomes A Leader Of Her Tribe

To college sports fans, Seminoles are the strong kids using muscle for Florida State University. They wear garnet and gold colors.  And sometimes, they put on a dramatic black.

To me the Seminoles are today’s members of the Seminole Tribe of Florida & more important, they are the fabled ancestors of today’s Seminole Tribe of Florida members. 

One unique tribal member of modern times who I wrote about for young readers is Betty Mae Tiger Jumper. 

In writing about her through SHE SANG PROMISE, I came to the story from outside the culture. A School Library Journal post that covers this outsider status.

http://blog.schoollibraryjournal.com/bowllansblog/2010/05/25/writers-against-racism-jan-godown-annino-2/

This life story of a girl who survived death threats in the 1920s & faced discrimination throughout her life is recognized by the 2011 American Library Association Social Responsibilities Round Table’s Feminist Taskforce.

http://americanlibrariesmagazine.org/news/ala/2011-amelia-bloomer-list-announced

Another title from the ALA Taskforce in its annual Amelia Bloomer Project List, includes a 10 year-old author who was also a 10-year old divorced child.  Her book helps us understand that this situation isn’t unique & that volunteer attorneys make a difference in children’s lives every day.  Nujood Ali is already a leader of her people by her divorce action. I hope that if she wants to, she can grow up to be a leader of her people in an official capacity, as did Betty Mae Tiger Jumper.

When I open up a black drawstring Seminole patchwork bag & invite children to pull out a shed snakeskin, they connect with the idea that Betty Mae was born into the important Snake Clan.   She grew up to hear repeatedly, the oral history of two girl ancestors who escaped brutal treatment on the Florida portion of the Trail of Tears in a dramatic run across the peninsula.  This ensured survival of Betty Mae’s Snake Clan.  Children I present to also hear about the traditional matriarchic society of Seminole people.

The patchwork bag also holds a piece of wood carved into a model flat-boat, by tribal elder Bobby Henry. These boats were one key to the Seminoles’ superior shallow Everglades travel, compared to Yankee canoeists of the 1800s who paddled in  deep-V boats that mired in muck.  The Seminoles stood & poled their floating log barge.

A photographic postcard in my collection, of Betty Mae’s royal Seminole grandfather, further connects children to the Seminoles’ unconquered past.

Children take to their hearts the letter written directly to them by her son, poet Moses Jumper, Jr.  who gifts them with two special words.

Excitement about alligator wrestling & puzzled reaction to unfamiliar tonal sounds, such as a chant to accompany a traditional dance, are also keen parts of the uncommon visit with Seminole culture. 

As an outsider to the Seminoles, I’m forever grateful that Mrs. Jumper made an overture to me across a table of crafts at an Indian Festival in the early 1980s. 

I attended to write a newspaper story.   I stood at her table reading a newspaper that I plucked from a stack of them, folded near the crafts.  It intrigued me to find my familiar medium among the soft piles of folded patchwork clothing in rainbow colors that grabbed attention.  Seminoles are known for this original wearable art, worldwide. 

Photo  from the Florida
Women's Hall of Fame, a
project of the Florida
Commission on the
Status of Women
www.fcsw.net

But, the Seminole people also wrote a newspaper?  My first ignorance.  Other blank spots in my education, missing pieces of the Seminole story, which is a key to the modern development of the state I moved to from New Jersey at age 13, were to begin to recede with my slow-forming link to Mrs. Jumper.  I cherish that our connection came through printed words that she brought that table, teaching me first with her newspaper that she edited.

As a barefoot child she survived death threats at her remote family camp.  Later Betty Mae begged her grandmother to be able to become literate at age 14. She received a formal education at boarding school in North Carolina, additional training in nursing in Oklahoma, & chose to return home to help her then-impoverished people, whom she loved. 

When she became the first woman elected a leader of the Seminole Tribe of Florida, in 1967, there was less than $40 in the bank account, she told me.

This was about 18 years before the equally legendary Wilma Mankiller earned the job of principal chief of the Cherokee people.  Betty Mae Tiger Jumper served a U.S. President on an advisory committee & was an invited presenter at the American Folklife Festival in Washington, D.C. in 1969. Her voice is heard on two Smithsonian folk music/storytelling CD recordings.  She was inducted into halls of fame, held an

honorary doctorate from Florida State University & earned many other honors.

In a long amazing life, some aspects most intrigue readers:

Why & how Betty Mae Jumper wrestled alligators 

Why she received death threats as a toddler & how she survived them

How a child who wasn’t literate at age 13, came to publish 3 books & edit two newspapers

Adults with an aesthetic interest marvel at the sewing of intricate geometric designs in cloth that mimic nature & carry names such as fire, lightning, & birds.

I am most lifted up by how a girl who didn’t read as a young child, valued the printed word after not enjoying the secrets of it during her first 14 years in South Florida. Please seek out her own writing in her collection of important stories that teach traditional ways & beliefs, LEGENDS of the SEMINOLES. http://www.semtribe.com/Culture/Legends.aspx

I also recommend her memoir for adults, A SEMINOLE LEGEND, written with my pal, ethno historian Patsy West, and published with the University Presses of Florida. http://www.upf.com/book.asp?id=JUMPEF01

Betty Mae Tiger Jumper set ambitious goals for a barefoot girl without a formal education until age 14.  And she met them: “ I had three goals in my life. To finish school, to take nurse’s training & come back and work among my people, & to write books.”

From Jan Godown Annino at http://www.bookseedstudio.wordpress.com/

SHE SANG PROMISE: The Story of Betty Mae Jumper, Seminole Tribal Leader,

by Jan Godown Annino, with oil paintings by Lisa Desimini. Afterword letter from Moses Jumper, Jr.   National Geographic Children’s Books

www.ngchildrensbooks.org (subject- biography- title in alphabetic order)

Giveaway offer - a free copy of SHE SANG PROMISE: The Story of Betty Mae Jumper, Seminole Tribal Leader.   In a comment to this post, please share a well- regarded non-fiction title (providing the author name, illustrator, if applicable, publisher,  & year of pub.) This title will be for the elementary ages, about a First Peoples/American Indian/Native American topic.  Jan will select one recipient, but there will be two books given, one for you & one which you are asked to present to a library of your choice. Many thanks!