Stepping Up to Lead and Serve: Women at Hope College in 20th Century Crises

31 West 10th Street,Holland MI 49423

10 March, 2022

Description

Stepping Up to Lead and Serve: Women at Hope College During Twentieth-Century Crises Currently, this will be an in-person program in the Holland Museum's Spark!Lab but will be moved to Zoom if Covid cases continue to rise or in the case of inclement weather. Masks will be required for the in-person program. If moved to Zoom, the link will be sent the day before the program by email. In celebration of Women’s History Month, hear some of the overlooked stories of Hope College women and their accomplishments in the 1930s and 40s, uncovered by current students Maria Seidl, Grace Pettinger, and Brooke Carbaugh with faculty advisor Prof. Lauren Janes. During the summer of 2021, Hope College students Maria Seidl, Grace Pettinger, and Brooke Carbaugh had the goal of uncovering and communicating an accurate account of the lives of women at Hope College in the 1930’s and 1940’s, based on the records at the Joint Archives of Holland. They combined this archival work with existing research on Hope College’s history and on national trends in higher education during the 1930s and 1940s. By examining several archival materials, the research team analyzed the daily lives of women during the early to mid-20th century. Amid national crises, Hope women created opportunities for themselves, resulting in the creation of multiple female organizations, many women majoring in STEM, and increased participation in campus social events. They also analyzed the way in which these women looked at events such as the Great Depression and World War II to best understand their perspectives and more accurately tell their stories. While these historians cannot create a complete picture of the past, analyzing the preserved pieces of their lives allowed them to approach a growing web of information to better understand these women’s untold stories.