Eleanor Flexner (1908-1995) wrote what became the preeminent book women's rights, during an era when “feminist” was a dirty word.
Eleanor Flexner (1908-1995) wrote what became the preeminent book women's rights, during an era when “feminist” was a dirty word.
You’re probably familiar with rebels without a cause, but what about rebels with a cause? This month on Womanica, we’re talking about women who broke rules that were meant to be broken. From the “Godmother of Title IX” Bernice Sandler, to the most prominent figure of the People Power Revolution, Corazon Aquino, to the “Queen of Civil Rights” Ruby Hurley, these women took major risks to upend the status quo and create meaningful change.
History classes can get a bad rap, and sometimes for good reason. When we were students, we couldn’t help wondering... where were all the ladies at? Why were so many incredible stories missing from the typical curriculum? Enter, Womanica. On this Wonder Media Network podcast we explore the lives of inspiring women in history you may not know about, but definitely should.
Every weekday, listeners explore the trials, tragedies, and triumphs of groundbreaking women throughout history who have dramatically shaped the world around us. In each 5 minute episode, we’ll dive into the story behind one woman listeners may or may not know–but definitely should. These diverse women from across space and time are grouped into easily accessible and engaging monthly themes like Educators, Villains, Indigenous Storytellers, Activists, and many more. Womanica is hosted by WMN co-founder and award-winning journalist Jenny Kaplan. The bite-sized episodes pack painstakingly researched content into fun, entertaining, and addictive daily adventures.
Womanica was created by Liz Kaplan and Jenny Kaplan, executive produced by Jenny Kaplan, and produced by Liz Smith, Grace Lynch, Maddy Foley, Brittany Martinez, Edie Allard, Lindsey Kratochwill, Adesuwa Agbonile, Carmen Borca-Carrillo, Taylor Williamson, Ale Tejeda, Sara Schleede, Abbey Delk, and Alex Jhamb Burns. Special thanks to Shira Atkins.
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Hello! From Wonder Media Network, I’m Jenny Kaplan. And this is Womanica.
This month, we’re talking about Rebels WITH a cause: women who broke rules that were meant to be broken. These women took major risks to upend the status quo and create meaningful change.
The cause for today’s rebel was a big one: the history of women’s struggle for rights in the United States. Though she was never officially trained as a historian, she wrote what became the pre-eminent book on the topic – during an era where “feminist” was a dirty word.
Let’s talk about Eleanor Flexner.
Eleanor was born in 1908, in Georgetown, Kentucky and raised in New York City.
Her father, Abraham, was the child of Jewish German immigrants, and the first in his family to graduate college. He went on to create something called The Flexner Report, which revolutionized medical education.. Eleanor’s mother, Anne Crawford, was a playwright. Her biggest hit was an adaptation of the novel, Mrs. Wiggs of the Cabbage Patch, a story of urban poverty.
As the child of two intellectual powerhouses, lots of expectations were put on Eleanor. Her mother wanted her to be a writer. Her family expected her to go to Bryn Mawr, like her older sister.
But Eleanor did things her own way.
She went to Swarthmore. She tried to join a sorority, but was iced out for being Jewish. She then campaigned for the school to abolish Greek life. Unsurprisingly, they said no.
After some graduate work in London, Eleanor moved to Manhattan, where her parents had an apartment. There, in between moments of leftist activism, she wrote. In 1938, when she was 30 years old, she published her first book: American Playwrights, 1918-1938: The Theater Retreats From Reality. In it, Eleanor laid into contemporary playwrights, who she thought ignored the social causes unfolding around them.
Eleanor practiced what she preached: She continued to lean into labor politics. Eleanor organized clerical workers, and helped the National Association of Colored Graduate Nurses fight segregation in hospitals.
In interviews throughout her life, Eleanor never pointed to one, clear inciting moment for taking on her next research project. And maybe that’s because it encompassed so much of her life’s work.
In the 1940s, Eleanor set out to compile a history of women in the United States. She knew she wanted to highlight stories of Black women, whose work had been largely ignored.
I think it’s important to consider what was happening in that moment in time: Women’s suffrage had only been legal for a handful of decades. Many Black women still couldn’t vote. Jim Crow laws dominated the south. And those who claimed the word “feminist” often looked and sounded… one way. White, straight, well-educated and upper-middle class.
And here came Eleanor. A Jewish, member of the Communist Party, who said, I want to write about working class women, and Black women, and labor reform. Because the story of suffrage that we’ve been fed… isn’t the whole story.
Eleanor spent years researching. She tracked down one of the heroes of the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory Fire, which killed 123 women and girls and spurred sweatshop workers to organize. She found the granddaughter of the only woman to hold a position with the Knights of Labor. And she found petitions calling for the abolition of slavery, written by women, in the 1830s. Eleanor dug much of this up with the help of two Black librarians: Dorothy Parker and Jean Blackwell Hutson.
Despite her incredibly thorough and groundbreaking work, Eleanor struggled to get her book published. Simon & Schuster, the publisher for her first book, wasn’t interested. Harper & Brothers told her to cut the stories of Black women, because they wouldn’t interest a larger audience.
In 1959, the first edition of Century of Struggle was finally published, thanks to some convincing from a Harvard historian. The book covered more than 300 years, and dove deep into the nuances of the women’s rights movement. Initially, the book was reviewed almost exclusively by women historians. One rare male reviewer noted he thought she was too sympathetic with her subjects.
A few years later, Betty Friedan’s book, The Feminine Mystique, cited Century of Struggle. And that catapulted Eleanor’s work into the mainstream.
More than a decade later, Eleanor went on to write another book – a biography of early feminist, Mary Wollstonecraft. However, she never seemed to accept the short shrift she got when trying to publish Century of Struggle.
For more than 50 years, Eleanor’s work has been a source of information and inspiration for writers, historians and students. By refusing to play by the rules, Eleanor laid the groundwork for what we now consider Women’s Studies.
Eleanor died in 1995. She was 86 years old.
All month, we’re talking about rebels with a cause. For more information, find us on Facebook and Instagram @womanicapodcast.
Special thanks to Liz Kaplan, my favorite sister and co-creator.
Talk to you tomorrow!