Women's History Month - March 2023 - & Notable Women of Oklahoma

Updated: 3/11/2023

​I.  What is it? 

• Women’s History Month in the United States occurs in March of each year to:
  • celebrate the achievements women have made throughout American history
  • recognize all that remains to be done.

 
When did it start?  

• 1987.  The U.S. Congress designated March as “Women’s History Month.” Between 1988 and 1994, Congress passed successive resolutions requesting and authorizing the U.S. President to proclaim Women’s History Month.  Since 1995, presidents have issued annual proclamations of Women’s History Month.

​Antecedents.  The origin story of Women’s History Month, however, began far earlier in the labor protests carried out by women in the nation’s paid workforce.

• 1857.  Most notably, a one-day strike and march by hundreds of women from the textile and needles factories in New York City on March 8, 1857, made history.  
  • Fed up with life-threatening workplace conditions, low pay, and excruciating hours, the women took to the streets.  
  • Their day of action initiated a labor movement that, due to the obstruction by powerful business interests prioritizing profit over fairness, required decades of hard effort to create positive change.​

• 1909.  In the USA, the first Woman’s Day celebration took place in New York City. 
• 1980’s.  By the early 1980s, cities and states across the country were holding Women’s Day celebrations.
• 1980.  President Jimmy Carter proclaimed the week of March 8 as “Women’s History Week.”  
• 1981.  The U.S. Congress established the second week of March as “National Women’s History Week.” 
• 1987.  The U.S. Congress designated March as “Women’s History Month.”

The most common way people give up their power is thinking they don’t have any.”  
--Alice Walker (1944-  ) American writer, poet, and activist.

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