benzie area women’s history project

The theme for this year's 28th annual Women's History Day was Which Way Home: Perspectives on Immigration.

This year we divided our "day" into two events. Our first program took place on Sunday, March 14, with a set of songs from the Songspinners and a showing of the Oscar nominated documentary Which Way Home, hosted by Alma College professor Stephany Slaughter, a field producer for the film. She answered questions and spoke about some other related films by women filmmakers.

Our second program, at the Mills Community House in Benzonia on Sunday, March 21, 2010, featured a program titled A Hull House Reunion: The Great Ladies of Halsted Street. Local women portrayed several women who were involved with one of the original "settlement" houses, Chicago's Hull House, which was co-founded in 1889 by Jane Addams and Ellen Gates Starr.

The afternoon also featured workshops with Judith Kay Minton on Ellis Island and the history of immigration and Wendy K. Bailey on immigration law. Katherine Ross led a discussion of the timely book The Butterfly's Way: Voices from the Haitian Dyaspora in the United States, edited by Edwidge Danticat, and Mary Anne Rivers closed the afternoon with song.

You can see photos from our second event on the photos page.

To email us, or to be on the mailing list, please see the contact page.

The Benzie Area Women's History Project is a committee affiliated with the Benzie Area Historical Society.

http://www.bawhp.org