Annette Abbott Adams, Tri Delta, #NotableSororityWomen, #WHM2020

Posted on March 26, 2020 by Fran Becque, Ph.D.

Annette Grace Abbott Adams was born on March 12, 1877 in Prattville, California. She attended Chico State Normal School and earned a teaching certificate. She taught school for four years to save money to attend the University of California, Berkeley. There she and her sister helped start a Delta Delta Delta chapter at Berkeley.

After graduating in 1904, she moved to Alturas, California, and taught high school. When she became principal at Modoc County High School in 1907, she was one of the first female principals in the state of California.

On August 13, 1906, she married Martin Houston “Mart” Adams who was two years her junior. Some say she married just to have a “Mrs.” In front of her name. She became dissatisfied with a principal’s salary and decided that law was a career for her. After she left for law school in 1910, the couple did not live together, but they never divorced.

In 1910, for every 200 men who were lawyers, judges and justices, there was only one female in those positions. In 1912, Adams graduated from the University of California Berkeley School of Law. That year she was one of the first women to be admitted to the California Bar. She and Marguerite Ogden Steele formed a partnership and served a mainly female clientele. Steele was a victim of the 1917 influenza epidemic.

After working for Woodrow Wilson’s election in California, when women could not vote in a Presidential election, she was rewarded with an appointment as an assistant Attorney General position. She served as an Assistant United States Attorney for the Northern District of California from 1914-19. In 1920, she was appointed as the Assistant Attorney General for the same district, making her the first female to be a United States Assistant Attorney General. She was admitted to practice before the U.S. Supreme Court in 1920.

In an interview published in the July 14, 1920, edition of the Chattanooga News, it was noted that she lived alone and made her own breakfast. She told the reporter:

Well, I find my greatest relaxation after the grind of the office in housework I guess it’s because I love my home so much that I’ve taken such an interest in the women’s fight against the high cost of food and clothing. I’m an active member of the ‘Housewives’ league, and I’ve often used my office and spare tie to do all I can to help out.

I’ve been preaching the gospel of saving. I boycotted 16 cent milk, I refused to eat 10 cent potatoes and I never bought a 17-cent loaf of bread in my life. And I have stopped wearing silk stockings.

Common sense – that is what America needs now. If the majority shows common sense the discontented minority will. I’m rather optimistic about the future.

A report in the 1920 Delta of Tri Delta, reiterated her thrift:

For the past year Mrs. Adams has been actively interested in methods for bringing down the soaring costs. She has given many talks before women’s and business men’s clubs, and was instrumental in forming the federal fair trade committee for San Francisco which has already accomplished much in combating prices.

Adams resigned the position in 1921 and was in private practice until 1935. She made a run for a seat on the San Francisco Board of Supervisors in 1923, but was unsuccessful.

In April 1926, the senior class of Tri Deltas were guests of honor at a luncheon that the local alumnae hosted. It took place on a Saturday afternoon at the Palace Hotel in San Francisco. Adams was one of the speakers.

On November 12, 1935, she was appointed Assistant Special Counsel. She was appointed Presiding Justice of the California Court of Appeal for the Third District in 1942. She was one of the highest ranking judges in the state. She was elected to a 12 year term on the Court of Appeal. In 1950 she became the first female to sit on the California Supreme Court in a special assignment (Gardner v. Jonathon Club (1950) 35 Cal.2d 343)

She retired in 1952 due to ill health and died in Sacramento in October 26, 1956.

 

 

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SuEllen Weissman Fried, Sigma Delta Tau, #NotableSororityWomen, #WHM2020

Posted on March 25, 2020 by Fran Becque, Ph.D.

On March 25, 1917, seven female Cornell University students founded Sigma Delta Tau. Their organization was originally called Sigma Delta Phi, but when they discovered the name belonged to another Greek-letter organization they changed the “Phi” to “Tau.”

Sigma Delta Tau’s founders are Dora Bloom (Turteltaub), Inez Dane Ross, Amy Apfel (Tishman), Regene Freund (Cohane), Marian Gerber (Greenberg), Lenore Blanche Rubinow, and Grace Srenco (Grossman).

There was also a male involved in the beginnings of Sigma Delta Tau. Bloom asked Nathan Caleb House  to write the ritual. “Brother Nat”  is the only man to honored with the organization’s gold membership pin.

SuEllen Weissman Fried attended University City High School in St. Louis, Missouri. During her senior year, she was president of the Student Council. From 1949 until 1951, she was a member of the St. Louis Municipal Opera (the MUNY, for locals) Dance Ensemble.

She graduated in 1950 and enrolled at Washington University. There, she was a member of the Modern Dance Club and a maid of honor on the Homecoming court. In September 1950, she was one of 20 women who formed Kappa Chi which in February of 1951 became a pledge chapter of Sigma Delta Tau. It was chartered as the Alpha Eta chapter on April 29, 1951. She served as her chapter’s corresponding secretary.

St. Louis Post-Dispatch, March 2, 1952

She married Harvey Fried, a member of Zeta Beta Tau, on June 29, 1952 after she finished her sophomore year. They would share their lives for 65 years until his death in 2018. They raised three children and are the grandparents of seven.

In 1975, Fried finished her Bachelor’s at Park University in Parkville, Missouri. She also earned a Master’s equivalency from the American Dance Therapy Association in 1996.

Fried’s passion for dance shaped her life and helped her become an advocate for children, inmates and those suffering from mental illness . She was a dance therapist for two decades. She spent 17 years, from 1961 until 1978 as a volunteer at Osawatomie State Hospital in eastern Kansas, south of Kansas City.

President Richard Nixon appointed her to his Task Force on the Mentally Handicapped in 1971. She was a consultant to the National Institute of Mental Health and the Center for the Advanced Study and Continuing Education in Mental Health.

Fried served as President of the Kansas Mental Health Association. In 1982, she founded STOP Violence, a program in which trained volunteers utilized Reaching Out From Within, a rehabilitation program, to teach prison inmates how to change their actions, thoughts and language. She is President Emeritus of Reaching Out From Within. In 1984, Sigma Delta Tau honored her with its Achievement Award and 20 years later she was named one of its Outstanding Alumnae.

She added bullying prevention to her repertoire and authored a number of books on the subject. In 2002, she founded BullySafeUSA. Fried served as President of Prevent Child Abuse America (PCAA) and she has a lifetime appointment as a member of its Board of Directors. She also was a guiding force in the philanthropic partnership between PCAA and Sigma Delta Tau. She was a speaker at her sorority’s centennial celebration in 2017.

She was included on George H.W. Bush’s Thousand Points of Light list. In 2015, she received a L’Oreal Paris Women of Worth Award in 2015.

 

 

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Leona Wilcox, Alpha Sigma Alpha, #NotableSororityWomen, #WHM2020

Posted on March 24, 2020 by Fran Becque, Ph.D.

Leona Wilcox was born in Osceola, Iowa, in 1891. She attended high school there and a newspaper report for 1908 noted her absence from the 11th grade for a week due to illness. After graduation, she may have taught elementary school for a few years before she enrolled at Drake University.

In 1922, Wilcox became a charter member of Alpha Sigma Alpha’s Iota Iota chapter. She was elected to membership in Phi Beta Kappa and Kappa Delta Pi. After graduating from Drake, she began teaching. She also did graduate work at Columbia University during summer vacations.

Wilcox served Alpha Sigma Alpha as a member of the Board of Supervisors on Standards and as Secretary from 1928 until 1936. On November 17, 1932, she was a speaker at the Founders’ Day banquet at the Grace Ransom Tea Room, which was located on the second floor above Walgreens at the southwest corner of Locust and Seventh Streets. Her topic was the “Early Founders of Alpha Sigma Alpha.”

For 42 years, Wilcox worked for the Des Moines, Iowa, school district. In 1934, she was Assistant Principal at Byron Rice School. That fall, she coordinated a production of Peter Pan. She did the scenery, costumes, and all incidental work. It was a resounding success. From 1936 until 1960, when she retired, she was Principal of Wallace School. It was located at 1404 East 13th Street.

Des Moines Register, May 18, 1960.

A fellow Alpha Sigma Alpha said of Wilcox, “That she does her work faithfully and well is already known.” Wilcox was a member of P.E.O. and the Iowa State History Association. She died in November of 1979.

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Ruth Katherine Byrns O’Meara, Ph.D., Theta Phi Alpha, #NotableSororityWomen, #WHM2020

Posted on March 23, 2020 by Fran Becque, Ph.D.

Ruth Katherine Byrns O’Meara, Ph.D., was born on June 6, 1906. She grew up in Lodi, Wisconsin. In 1921, as a high school student, she won a History of Lodi competition, writing about her hometown. At the University of Wisconsin, Madison, she was a charter member of the Nu chapter of Theta Phi Alpha when it was installed in 1926, the year she graduated with a Bachelor’s degree. Two years later, she earned a Master’s degree.

She took a position with the Bureau of Educational Records and Guidance at the University of Wisconsin and started a Ph.D. program at Wisconsin. While working on her doctorate she served as Chairman of the Board of Directors for Nu chapter. She was awarded a Ph.D. in 1932 and continued to work at the university. During this time, she served as Theta Phi Alpha’s scholarship chairman for a short while.

In 1935, Fordham University in New York hired her as an associate professor and director of teacher training. While there, she met another faculty member who was teaching philosophy in the graduate school. William Joseph O’Meara was a Canadian whose degrees were earned at the University of Toronto. His undergraduate degree was from the University’s St. Michael’s College.

On December 26, 1935, the couple married at St. Patrick’s Cathedral in New York City. The bride wore a long white satin gown with a fitted cloak of white brocade. A small fitted hat with a shoulder length veil covered her head. White camellias formed her corsage and she carried a small missal. Her younger sister, Lois, who would go on to earn a Ph.D., too, was her attendant. A breakfast at the Hotel Brevoort followed the ceremony and Mass.

A daughter was stillborn on January 26, 1941, and is buried in St. Patrick’s Cemetery in Lodi, Wisconsin. Another daughter was born in November of 1942.

Ottawa Citizen, (Canada), May 1, 1943

After the end of World War II, the couple moved to the Chicago area. She joined the faculty at Loyola University and her husband taught at the University of Chicago. In 1950, she was awarded a Fulbright grant to teach educational psychology at the University of Leeds. Her seven-year-old daughter joined her on the ocean voyage across the Atlantic and attended a convent school in England.

The O’Mearas collaborated on some research projects which were published in educational journals and The Commonwealth magazine. She wrote a story, Angelina’s Afternoon, that is included in Pilgrims All, a collection of children’s stories by Catholic writers.

O’Meara became a widow in 1978 when her husband died suddenly on a trip to Canada. Although I could find no obituary or gravestone on-line, I believe she died in 1995.

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Anna Kelton Wiley, Pi Beta Phi, #NotableSororityWomen, #WHM2020

Posted on March 22, 2020 by Fran Becque, Ph.D.

Anna Kelton Wiley was born in 1877. She enrolled at Columbian University (now George Washington University) and was awarded the Kendall Scholarship. There she joined Pi Beta Phi and on January 5, 1895, she became a duly initiated member. She won the Sterrett medal in physics. Her college friends called her “Nan.” After graduating in 1897, she spent two years working in the library at the Department of Agriculture and 10 years in the Copyright Office at the Library of Congress. In the fall of 1910, she enrolled at the Washington College of Law and planned to become a lawyer. Suffrage and civic betterment were her interests and she devoted herself to these efforts.

Her engagement to Dr. Harvey W. Wiley was announced in December 1910. A newspaper article in the March 27, 1955 edition of the Daily Oklahoman told of the story behind the marriage. Dr. Wiley, known as the “Father of the Pure Food Act,” was 30 years her senior. According to the story, she became the Doctor’s secretary after graduation and worked for him for two years until he was sent overseas. Ten years later the two met by chance on a streetcar. He “opened his watch case and showed her her own picture which he carried for ten years.” Another account told of Dr. Wiley meeting her when he addressed a group of “militant suffragists.”

The couple married in a small ceremony at her mother’s home in Washington, D.C. on February 27, 1911. Two sons, Harvey, Jr. and James, were born in 1912 and 1914, respectively. The press called them the “pure food” babies.

The Elizabeth Cady Stanton Suffrage Club hosted a luncheon in honor of her marriage. A 1911 description of Wiley noted that the suffrage movement was one of her main concerns:

Her sympathies outside her work have been principally bound up with the woman suffrage movement. For the past few years she has held office in the local organizations, helped to organize meetings, worked on the petitions, spoken at open air meetings and attended as a delegate the Forty-Second Annual Convention of the National Woman Suffrage Association.

When suffragists picketed the White House in 1917, Wiley, then a mother of two young sons, was among them. She was arrested and spent 5 days in jail.

Wiley was also an active member of Pi Phi’s D.C. Alumnae Club. In 1924, when Pi Beta Phi gave the portrait of the First Lady Grace Goodhue Coolidge to the Nation, the Wileys hosted a reception at the Library of Congress for the more than 1,100 Pi Phis who descended upon Washington.

A 1920s program of Pi Beta Phi’s Washington, DC, Alumnae Club. The December 12 meeting took place at the Wiley’s home and Dr. Wiley was the speaker.

Dr. Wiley died in 1930 at the age of 86. In his autobiography, the last book he wrote, he included a dedication to his wife:

To Anna Kelton Wiley, my beloved wife, the mother of my boys, who, without neglecting her motherly and household duties, has devoted her life to the welfare of women; first, to secure for them the right to vote, and second, equality before the law, with my full consent and approval. I dedicated this book, a simple narrative of my life, its victories and defeats. Her character and devotion to me have been strong factors in my success, and her sympathy and advice inspiration in defeat.

Wiley was twice the Chairman of the National Woman’s Party, 1930-32 and 1940-42. She served as editor of the Party’s publication, Equal Rights, from 1940-45. Wiley was a long-time member of the Major L’Enfant Chapter of the Daughters of the American Revolution. She served as Chairman of Legislation for DC’s Women’s City Club. At the age of 77, she put her efforts into fighting for an Equal Rights Amendment, which was first introduced in 1923.

1955

In the summer of 1959, she attended the convention of the General Federation of Women’s Clubs in California. She was in her 80s and it was her 23rd GFWC convention, for she had served the organization in many capacities. Wiley looked forward to all the events, from a Hollywood banquet to a Lawrence Welk concert. One of the oldest women in attendance, she likely ran circles around the other women.

Wiley died on January 6, 1964 at the age of 86. She is buried with her husband, a Civil War veteran, at Arlington National Cemetery.

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Harriet Hankins, Tri Sigma, #NotableSororityWomen, #WHM2020

Posted on March 21, 2020 by Fran Becque, Ph.D.

Harriet Parker Hankins was born in 1884 and grew up in Williamsburg, Virginia. She enrolled at Farmville Normal College (now Longwood University) and became a member of the Alpha chapter of Sigma Sigma Sigma.

Harriet Hankins is at the top left of this 1901 composite.

Hankins was the sorority’s first National Treasurer. It is her drawing on the cover of the first edition of The Triangle of Sigma Sigma Sigma.

After graduation, she enrolled in a nursing program at Garfield Memorial Hospital in Washington, D.C. During World War I she made at least two transatlantic crossings to serve as an American Red Cross Nurse. Early in the war, she was in Germany. When diplomatic relations with the country ended, she returned home. The Daily Press reported on April 29, 1915, that her parents were anxious for her return.

Daily Press (Newport News, VA), April 29, 1915

Hankins sailed out of Rotterdam on May 29 and arrived in New York on June 11, 1915.

She then served with the Army on the Mexican border. In May 1916, Hankins was in Washington, D.C. teaching “diet tent cooking” to new nursing recruits. When the United States entered the war, she served in France and Belgium.

Daily Press (Newport News, VA), December 28, 1919

On January 11, 1920, it was reported the Hankins visited her parents for a long rest after spend two years in Europe. Hankins, “saw much of the suffering in Belgium and other belligerent countries and her experience has been an unusual one,” according to the Daily Press.

At some point she transitioned from an American Red Cross Nurse to a Lieutenant Colonel in the Army Nursing Corps. Hankins was assigned to several posts including one at Walter Reed Army Hospital in Washington, D.C. During World War II, she served in the Philippines.

She retired in 1954 and shortly afterwards she moved back to Williamsburg. Hankins was active in the Daughters of the American Revolution. She died on August 25, 1967, at 82 years old and is interred at Arlington National Cemetery.

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Vivian Osborne Marsh, Delta Sigma Theta, #NotableSororityWomen, #WHM2020

Posted on March 20, 2020 by Fran Becque, Ph.D.

Most of Vivian Osborne Marsh’s childhood was spent in Houston, Texas, where she was born in 1898. Her father died in 1910 and three years later she, her mother, and her sister moved to Berkeley, California. She applied to the University of California, Berkeley using her grades from Houston and Berkeley High Schools. Although her grades were excellent, the university required her to take four entrance examinations. She did well on the first two and Berkeley waived the other two.

Her undergraduate study was in anthropology and she was the first African American women to major in that field at Berkeley. She earned her degree in 1920.

Dean of Women Lucy Stebbins told her about the interest shown by Delta Sigma Theta Sorority, Inc. to establish a chapter at Berkeley. Shortly after her 1920 graduation, Marsh founded the undergraduate Kappa chapter, the first NPHC sorority on campus. The first meeting took place in Wheeler Hall on February 13, 1921 and she was the chapter’s first President. She was still at the university, this time studying for a Master’s in anthropology. She married Leon F. Marsh in 1921. Her master’s thesis was “Types and Distribution of Negro Folklore in America.” She completed her degree in 1921. It was conferred in 1922, the year the first of her two sons, Leon, Jr., was born.

In 1929, she organized Omega Sigma Alumnae Chapter (now Berkeley Bay Area Alumnae Chapter) and served as its first President. She was the Far West regional director and then Delta Sigma Theta’s seventh National President from 1935 until 1939. During her tenure, she started the Traveling Library and Teen Lift. The first effort supplied books to rural districts in Georgia. The Teen Lift program provided transportation for youth to visit people and places, and especially cultural events, beyond their neighborhood.  In 1948, she and her sister Bessie started Delta Sigma Theta’s Patroness Club in the Bay Area.

Marsh was active in other organizations as well. These included the California State Association of Colored Women, Order of Calanthe, Order of the Eastern Star, and many more. In 1941, she served as President of the California State Association of Colored Women. Four years later, she became vice-president of the National Council of Negro Women.

In 1981, the 60th anniversary celebration of Delta Sigma Theta’s Kappa chapter was a tribute to Marsh. Berkeley’s Mayor proclaimed it Vivian Osbourne Marsh Day.

She had a stroke while attending a convention of the Court of Calanthe in El Centro, California. The Supreme Court of Calanthe and Delta Sigma Theta shared the cost of a $2600 air ambulance ride to Berkeley. At Herrick Hospital, Marsh never regained consciousness. She died at a convalescent facility on March 8, 1986.

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Helen Joy Hinckley, Chi Omega, #NotableSororityWomen, #WHM2020

Posted on March 19, 2020 by Fran Becque, Ph.D.

I came across a scrapbook belonging to Helen Joy Hinckley. She created it when she was in France and Belgium working as a Red Cross nurse with the Harvard Surgical Unit. She wrote her captions in French and the greetings written by doctors and patients are in French, too. Her scrapbook is in the collection of the Paul S. Russell, M.D., Museum of Medical History and Innovation at Massachusetts General Hospital. I couldn’t find out much about her life, except that it appears she spent it as a nurse, helping people. She was born in the same Maine town in which she is buried.

Born and raised in Blue Hill, Maine, Hinckley was a member of the Beta chapter of Chi Omega at Colby College. Her chapter knew her by her middle name, “Joy,” and she served as an officer. She was at Colby from 1906 to 1908. She studied nursing at Massachusetts General Hospital from 1910 until 1913 and she became a Registered Nurse.

Hinckley sailed to France in 1915 to help with the war effort and she was there for four years. A headline in a August 4, 1919 newspaper about her service read, “Won personal thanks of King George.”

In 1936, she was supervisor of the Infirmary at Pickwick Dam in Hardin County, Tennessee. The project to build the dam began in March 1935 and it opened in May 1938. In a report to the Colby Alumni, Hickley said:

Pickwick is the only wholly electrical town in the United States. It is very nice except when the current goes off. At the present moment we are having a violent thunderstorm. The river has risen so high the Dam is covered.

Hinckley spent some time as a Registered Nurse at the University of Michigan. She died in Maine in 1955 at the age of 65.

I believe this to be a picture of Helen Joy Hinckley
Photo taken on the ship to France
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Thelma Berlack Boozer, Alpha Kappa Alpha, #NotableSororityWomen, #WHM2020

Posted on March 18, 2020 by Fran Becque, Ph.D.

Thelma Edna Berlack Boozer was born in Florida on September 26, 1906. In 1920, she moved to New York and attended Theodore Roosevelt High School in the Bronx. She graduated with highest honors in 1924. As a school reporter for the now defunct New York World, she entered its “Biggest News of the Week” competition. She earned a $50 bonus as well as a $20 cash prize. That $70 prize is equivalent to more than $1,000 in 2020 money. In addition to her writing skills, she was an accomplished speaker. She won a $50 award representing her high school in a national oratorical contest sponsored by the New York Times.

Thelma Berlack Boozer

As a New York University student, she became a member of the Lambda chapter of Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority, Incorporated. The chapter began as an undergraduate and graduate chapter serving New York City colleges and universities. It became an undergraduate chapter in 1925, when its graduate chapter, Tau Omega, was formed.

As a freshman and sophomore, she was the New York society reporter for the Pittsburgh Courier, a black newspaper that had both national and local editions. Her column, Chatter and Chimes, started in the New York edition of the paper.

After her stepfather died in 1926, the family’s financial situation changed and she faced a dilemma. She took a full-time job with the New York Amsterdam News and she took courses at night, keeping up a schedule to graduate on time in 1928. Three weeks after she started at the paper, she became its assistant managing editor. After earning her undergraduate degree, she began a graduate work at NYU.

During this time of working and studying for a Master’s degree, she served a year as Editor of The Ivy Leaf, the sorority’s magazine. She married James C. Boozer in 1930. He worked for the United States Postal Service. Boozer finished her coursework and wrote her thesis on The Evolution of Negro Journalism in the United States.

From 1929 until 1935, she served her sorority as Director of the North Atlantic region. She was chair of Alpha Kappa Alpha’s 17th Boulé in New York City from December 26-29, 1934. A novel event which she coordinated took place on the morning of December 30. It was a coast-to-coast radio program recorded at the NBC Studios in Radio City. Among the 300 people who witnessed the stage presentation was sorority founder Ethel Hedgeman Lyle. The audio part of the 30-minute program was aired on WJZ. Among the performers was Etta Motten.

Boozer continued working for New York Amsterdam News. She was on the board of the Harlem Newspaper Club when it was founded in 1932. Barbara, the first of the Boozers’ two daughters, was born in 1937. The following year, Omega Psi Phi Fraternity awarded Boozer its achievement medal in journalism. She was also honored with the Brooklyn Women’s Service League’s World’s Fair Medal in journalism.

The January 3, 1942 edition of the Pittsburgh Courier reported on a banquet at the Grand Street Boys’ Association which was “crowded to capacity by more than 400 diners who had paid $1.50 apiece to give visible and oral testimony of their appreciation.” Boozer, “TEB as she is affectionately known,” was leaving Harlem for Jefferson City, Missouri. After 15 years at the newspaper, she was to be on the faculty of the journalism school which was to open at Lincoln University.

The report of her going away event told that “her proudest moment was perhaps the recent occasion when she was recalled to the Theodore Roosevelt High School to address the two senior assemblies. This marked the first time that any graduate has ever been asked to return to the school.”

Boozer left Missouri and returned east. Her daughter Thelma was born in 1946 in New York City. Boozer took on writing jobs and served as Assistant Managing Editor of the New York Age.

March 26, 1949 New York Age

Mayor Robert F. Wagner appointed her to do public relations work in the Office of the Borough President of Manhattan in 1950. The New York branch of the National Association of Negro Business and Professional Womens’ Club awarded her its Sojourner Truth Award in 1954.

She spoke at the Barber-Scotia College Club Founders’ Day event in 1959. It took place at Rendall Memorial Presbyterian Church in Harlem. Boozer “received her heartiest applause when she reminded her audience that we cannot turn a blind eye or deaf ear to our New York City schools while we fight for integration in Little Rock and Virginia.”

Boozer continued to work for the city in various capacities utilizing her journalistic talents until she retired in 1973. Her oral history interview in 1981 is part of Columbia University’s United Negro College Fund project. She was 94 years old when she died in 2001.

The Tau Omega Chapter of Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority awards the Thelma Berlack Boozer Scholarship for Academic Excellence.

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Minna Goldsmith Mahler, Delta Phi Epsilon, #NotableSororityWomen, #WHM2020

Posted on March 17, 2020 by Fran Becque, Ph.D.

On March 17, 1917, five coeds at Washington Square College Law, a Division of New York University, founded Delta Phi Epsilon. The DIMES, as they are referred to, are Dorothy Cohen Schwartzman, Ida Bienstock Landau, Minna Goldsmith Mahler, Eva Effron Robin, and Sylvia Steierman Cohn. Delta Phi Epsilon was formally incorporated under New York State law on March 17, 1922.

That these five women were law students back in the day before women could vote in a federal election is impressive. Today, one must have a bachelor’s degree to apply to law school. In 1917, this was not the case. While the American Bar Association was formed in 1878, the first two women to join the organization did so a year after Delta Phi Epsilon was founded. In 1906, the Association of American Law Schools adopted a requirement that law be a three-year course of study.

Delta Phi Epsilon’s founders were between the ages of 17 and 19 when they formed the organization. They were working on an undergraduate degree in law. Today one needs an undergraduate degree to enter a law school

Minna Goldsmith married Benjamin Mahler in 1922. She had a major hand in the creation of Delta Phi Epsilon’s constitution and bylaws and she served as the organizations first International President in 1922-23.

The radio program schedule, Times Union (Brooklyn, NY), November 12, 1930

She practiced law in Jersey City, New Jersey, and raised her family. In April 1941, she was a speaker at a meeting of the current events group of the Passaic Section, National Council of Jewish Woman. Her topic was “Plans for a Future World Order.” According to the newspaper account, she was a “former president of the Jersey City Council of Jewish Women, a former State president of the National Council and former National legislative chairman.”

In October, 1955 she spoke at the Bergen Ethical Society meeting held at the Henry B. Milnes School in Fair Lawn, New Jersey. She had a “wide experience in United Nations activities.” Mahler was a trustee of the New Jersey branch of the American Association for United Nations. She also served as president of the Maplewood AAUN chapter.

New York Daily News, September 22, 1957

For many years she served as State Chairman for United Nations week in New Jersey. She served on the United Nation’s Human Rights Committee and she was a United Nations observer.

Asbury Park Press, December 7, 1960

World peace was a cause near and dear to her heart and she worked ceaselessly for the cause. She died in August 1989.

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