Michigan Women's Hall of Fame celebrates 26 years, 10 inductees

Lansing, MI –A Pulitzer Prize winner, an actress with a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, and an American Indian activist of international note are among the 10 notable women selected by independent juries for induction into the 2009 class of the Michigan Women’s Hall of Fame. The women will be honored at a benefit dinner to be held Wednesday, October 21 at the Kellogg Hotel and Conference Center in East Lansing.

Among the 2009 Michigan Women’s Hall of Fame Contemporary honorees are:

● Grace Lee Boggs (lives in Detroit, MI)
A long-time advocate for civil rights, labor, and women’s issues, Boggs also helped to establish co-ops, community gardens, and youth programs in her adopted city. Detroit’s Boggs Center to Nurture Community Leadership bears her esteemed name.
● Glenda Lappan and Elizabeth Phillips (live in East Lansing, MI)
This team of educators from Michigan State University created a comprehensive middle school mathematics curriculum used in all 50 states and donated the royalties from their work back to the university to support further mathematics education research.
● Kay Givens McGowan (lives in Grosse Ile, MI)
This professor of anthropology also serves as a dedicated activist on behalf of American Indians; in 2005, she represented the U.S. at an international gathering that crafted the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples.
● Jessica Rickert (lives in Interlochen, MI)
Rickert was the first female American Indian dentist in the country, helped establish dental clinics for two tribes in Michigan, and writes a dental column that is read in native newspapers from coast to coast.
● Betty Tableman (lives in Lansing, MI)
This former director of the Michigan Department of Mental Health Prevention Services unit helped thousands of young children and their parents move toward the development of healthy, nurturing connections.
● Marlo Thomas (born in Deerfield, MI)
Creator and star of the ’60s TV show “That Girl” with four Emmys to her credit, Thomas is also famous as a supporter of feminist causes and for continuing her father’s work on behalf of the St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital.

The Hall of Fame honorees in the Historical category include:

● Margaret Chandler (born in Muskegon, MI)
Decades of her hard work resulted in federal recognition for the Little River Band of Ottawa Indians in 1994 and in the preservation of hunting and fishing rights asserted by the 1836 Treaty of Washington.
● Ruth Ellis (associated with Detroit, MI)
This African-American entrepreneur opened her home and her heart to Detroit’s gay and lesbian community. Her life inspired two documentaries and the creation of the Ruth Ellis Center, which provides services for runaway, homeless, and at-risk LGBT youth.
● Edna Ferber (born in Kalamazoo, MI)
Widely regarded as one of the greatest writers of her day, Ferber—the first Pulitzer Prize winner in the Hall of Fame—penned 13 novels including “Cimarron” and “Giant” and Broadway hits such as “Stage Door” and “Showboat.”

Also honored on the evening of October 21 will be Gerald Beckwith, the posthumous recipient of the Philip A. Hart Award for his work in helping to establish the Michigan Women’s Studies Association and the Hall of Fame.

The site of the 2009 induction ceremony and dinner, the Kellogg Hotel and Conference Center, is located at 55 South Harrison Avenue, East Lansing. A reception will begin at 5:00 p.m., with dinner at 6:00 p.m. and the ceremony at 7:00 p.m.

Tickets for the event, which are priced at $125, may be reserved by visiting http://www.michiganwomenshalloffame.org/ or by calling (517) 484-1880, extension 203.

The Hall of Fame, established in 1983, was the brainchild of the Michigan Women’s Studies Association (MWSA), a professional organization of academicians concerned with what is thought and taught about women in the state’s schools, colleges, and universities. “It was a natural extension of our work in the classroom,” explained MWSA President Gladys Beckwith, “and another means of disseminating information about Michigan women, past and present.”

Patterned after the National Women’s Hall of Fame in Seneca Falls, New York, the Michigan Hall was the first of its kind to recognize high-achieving women of an individual state.

Over the years, nearly 250 women have been named to this esteemed body. Some are ‘firsts’ or ‘founders’; that is, they were the first females to assume a particular role of leadership, such as Michigan’s first female U.S. senator Debbie Stabenow, or the founders of new entities like Bina West Miller, who established the first life insurance company for women. Another category of women are considered experts in their fields: for instance, Catherine Carter Blackwell is a recognized authority on African history and culture. And many inductees are Michigan’s proud representatives on a national stage. An example of this is Lily Tomlin, whose creative abilities have earned her two Tonys, six Emmys, a Grammy, two Peabody Awards, and an Academy Award nomination.

Biographical information, photographs, and lesson plans relating to the inductees may be found at http://www.michiganwomenshalloffame.org/, and a commemorative plaque for each woman hangs in the Michigan Women’s Historical Center in Lansing. This center houses a museum dedicated to Michigan women’s history and art, a library of women’s history materials, and public meeting spaces.