Let’s celebrate role of women in history

During these waning days of Women’s History Month, let’s all resolve to focus on the issues the observance raises not just in March but all year long.

Current events offer a reminder of how far women have come along with the difficulties that remain.

Women’s History Month has its roots in a weeklong commemoration that started being held about four decades ago before being extended to a full 31 days later in the 1980s.

This year’s observance comes at a time when women’s contribution to American history is in the spotlight. There have been continued observances of the 100th anniversary of the 1920 enactment of the 19th Amendment, which gave women the right to vote.

This year’s theme is a continuation of 2020’s “Valiant Women of the Vote: Refusing to Be Silenced.” The subject of the women’s suffrage movement in America and abroad demands serious attention. Today many of us take for granted that people should have the right to vote regardless of their gender. It’s shocking to learn just how difficult it was to secure that right, and what tremendous sacrifices so many had to make before it came to pass.

There have been programs at area colleges, museums and libraries exploring the breadth of women’s issues, involving everything from challenges having women serve on juries to great stories of women who succeeded as entrepreneurs, entertainers, politicians and in other walks of life despite tremendous obstacles placed before them.

Some programs went far beyond American history, addressing topics such as women in the Bible. Indeed, women had a role in every aspect of history from the beginning, though it is often overlooked. Women’s History Month offers a good way to revisit these subjects and consider how women influenced and were affected by events of the past and present.

Current events offer a reminder of how far women have come along with the difficulties that remain. We have a female vice president and women of both political parties playing other major roles in government. There are plenty of success stories for women in business, entertainment, sports and other endeavors. Yet the allegations against New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo remind us of the challenges women still face in the workplace, and the uproar over unequal treatment of NCAA women’s basketball players points to continued unfairness despite decades of efforts to turn things around.

The COVID-19 pandemic also has had a profound impact on women. That includes the many who work in essential jobs such as health care, and the moms who have had to balance working from home with helping their own young children navigate virtual learning.

But through it all, women continue to persevere and rise to whatever occasion arises. Spending a month looking back at great historical figures such as Abigail Adams, Susan B. Anthony, Sojourner Truth, Alice Paul and Rosa Parks should serve as inspiration to strive for even greater gains.

So keep studying women’s history in America and around the world, whether it be at a local library or museum or using the many online resources that are available.

A good place to start is the website womenshistorymonth.gov, a collaboration involving the Library of Congress, National Archives and Records Administration, National Endowment for the Humanities, National Gallery of Art, National Park Service, Smithsonian Institution and United States Holocaust Memorial Museum. Their goal is to commemorate and encourage the study, observance and celebration of the vital role of women in American history.

All of us can benefit from the opportunity.