JANUARY 7: TODAY'S INSPIRING WOMEN
THELMA "BUTTERFLY" MCQUEEN
She was born today in 1911. Originally a dancer, McQueen first appeared in film in 1939 as Prissy, Scarlett O'Hara's maid, in Gone with the Wind. She was unable to attend the movie's premiere because it was held at a whites-only theater.
Esmeralda Arboleda Cadavid
A Colombian politician and the first woman elected to the Senate of Colombia (1958 to 1961), she was born today in 1921. Before Columbia recognized suffrage for women in 1954, Esmeralda Arboleda and a few other women held official posts in the government, but she officially served as a senator beginning in 1958.
Zora Neale Hurston was born today in 1891. She would go on to become one of the the preeminent writers of twentieth-century African-American literature and one of the leading female figures of the Harlem Renaissance. She is most widely known as the author of Their Eyes Were Watching God.
Zora Neale Hurston
Today in 1955, Marian Anderson debuted at the Metropolitan Opera in the role of the fortune teller Ulrica in Guiseppe Verdi’s “Un Ballo in Machera” (The Masked Ball). That night she became the first Black performer to grace the Met’s stage as a regular company member. She is remembered as one of the best American contraltos of all time.
Marian Anderson
DEEPER DIVE
“I didn’t mind playing a maid the first time, because I thought that was how you got into the business. But after I did the same thing over and over, I resented it. I didn’t mind being funny but I didn’t like being stupid.”