Researched and written by Roxann Ploss

Gloria Bloom Allred, long known as a champion of women’s rights, was the only child of Jewish parents, born in  Philadelphia in 1941.  While attending the University of Pennsylvania, she met and married her first husband, giving birth to daughter Lisa (today, also an attorney) in 1961.

After divorcing, she moved back home and finished her degree in English at the University.  While teaching in a local high school, she earned her Master’s Degree, got caught up in the burgeoning civil rights movement and moved to Watts in Los Angeles. 

In 1968, she married William Allred, attended Loyola Law School, passed the California Bar exam in 1975 and divorced in 1987.

A horrifying experience while traveling in Mexico left her scarred emotionally and determined to fight for justice for all abused women.

She took on many cases which she classified as gender apartheid.  Notably, Ms. Allred has taken on the Boy Scouts of America for the exclusion of a girl applicant, Sav-On drugstores for segregating toy sections based on sex, Aaron Spelling for allegedly firing an actress who became pregnant while under contract for a t.v. series.

She was instrumental in the decision that the century-old practice of refusing female membership in the famous Friar’s Club would come to an end.  It was also she who sued a West LA restaurant for refusing to seat a same-sex couple in one of its private booths.

After seeing the footage of Michael Jackson dangling his baby from the balcony of his hotel, she immediately contacted California’s Child Protective Services demanding an investigation as to the safety of Jackson’s children.

More recently, she represented three fired employees of Circuit City in an age-discrimination suit.

Heavily involved in the case(s) arguing in favor of same-sex marriage, she has worked pro bono for those whom she insists have been unconstitutionally denied their right to obtain marriage licenses.  In 2008, the California Supreme Court agreed.

She has fought tirelessly for the rights of widows and relatives of soldiers KIA in Afghanistan, arguing that banks refusing to cash bereavement checks had caused “cruel and unusual” suffering for those struggling to find the money to BURY a loved one!!!

The abundance of good work for the civil rights of all Americans has led many to question her involvement in more high-profile cases which seem to have little merit other than headlines in the media. 

She represented, for instance, a woman suing Dodi Fayed for breaking off their engagement so that he could continue a relationship with Princess Diana.  (The suit was dropped when both of the latter died.)

Media darling Amber Frey was represented by Allred when she was called as a witness in the case against Scott Peterson and in the book deal which followed.

She represented two of the many confirmed “girlfriends” of Tiger Woods.  Another client, a massage therapist who had been arrested for prostitution in the past, was suing a Illinois lieutenant-gubernatorial candidate for harassment.

This was reminiscent of the case she handled for Rhonda Miller who was suing Arnold Schwarzenegger for sexual harassment.  In dismissing the case, the court found that Miller had waited until the gubernatorial run rather than file soon after the incident.

She also, more recently, stood firmly behind (hand on shoulder for support) Sharon Bialek who accused Herman Cain also of sexual harassment. . The case seems to have disappeared along with Cain’s candidacy. 

This is not to say that these incidents did not, in fact, happen or that women who are going to court for ANY reason should not be granted counsel.  But representing women who knowingly enter affairs with NOTABLY married men and then claim to be abused emotionally when they find out they are not “the ONLY relationship he was in”, lends credence where there should be none. 

Some argue that publicity-seeking women who might just as easily keep their affairs to themselves, actually detract from those women who are in TRULY demeaning and debilitating situations.  And there is the danger that those who are hammered daily with “poor me; I never wanted to be in the public eye” stories (when, in fact, the stories are the result of the “victims coming forward”) may become anesthetized to problems which are far more newsworthy.

“Because of my life experiences, I understand that I have an opportunity to help other women,” Allred told the Los Angeles Business Journal.  It is a worthy goal and should be applauded.  However, the question does arise, on  occasion, is it actually serving the cause or is it looking for the limelight?  Possibly it is both, the means serving the end?



GABRIELLE GIFFORDS

Submitted by Barbara Chandler

Gabrielle (Gabby) Giffords, the 8^th congressional district representative for the state of Arizona since 2007, was born (in 1970 in Tucson, Arizona) to and raised in a mixed religious environment by her Jewish father and Christian Science-practicing mother. She has identified herself with Judaism since 2001 and ultimately became the first Jewish congresswoman from the state of Arizona, along with being only the third woman to hold that office.

Her earlier public education in Tucson was followed by a B.A. in Sociology and Latin American History from Scripps College in California in 1993 and a Masters of Regional Planning from Cornell University in 1996. Her studies on Mexico-United States relations while at Cornell led to a Fulbright scholarship in Chihuahua, Mexico from 1993 to 1994.

Her business background began with working as an associate for regional economic development at Price Waterhouse in New York City. In 1996, she became president and CEO of El Campo Tire Warehouses, a local chain of auto service centers founded by her grandfather. The business was sold to Goodyear Tire in 2000 and, at the time, she commented on the difficulties local businesses face when competing against large national firms.

After being elected to the Arizona House of Representatives in 2000, she was then elected to the Arizona Senate in 2002; she was, at that time, the youngest woman elected to that body and was re-elected in 2004. While serving in the legislature, she showed an interest in expanding health care access, mental health, and improving education and health care and expanded educational opportunities for young children. She was named Outstanding Legislator for 2003 by the Arizona Family Literacy organization as well as the 2004 Legislator of the Year by the Mental Health Association of Arizona. She also earned the Sierra Club’s Most Valuable Player award

Elected to serve in the U.S. Congress in the 2006 elections, she displayed her political leanings during her first month in office by voting in favor of increased federal funding for embryonic stem-cell research, raising the minimum wage, endorsing the 9/11 Commission recommendations, new rules for the House of Representatives targeting ethical issues, and the repeal of $14 billion of subsidies to big oil companies, in favor of renewable energy subsidies and the founding of the Strategic Renewable Energy Reserve.

Her stances on health care reform and illegal immigration were sources of attention for those opposed to her candidacy and have made her a recipient of criticism from various conservative groups. By 2010 after being re-elected for her third term, she had solidified her reputation as a “Blue Dog” Democrat and has described herself as a “former Republican”.

On January 8, 2011, Giffords was shot in the head outside a Safeway grocery store in Casas Adobes, Arizona, during her first “Congress on Your Corner” gathering of the year. The suspect, Jared Lee Loughner, ran up to the crowd and began firing, hitting nineteen people of whom six died. Gifford’s intern, Daniel Hernandez Jr., provided first aid assistance to her immediately after she was wounded and is credited with saving her life. She was promptly evacuated to the University Medical Center of Tucson in critical condition, though she was still conscious and “following commands” at the time.

On the same day, doctors performed emergency surgery to extract skull fragments and a small amount of necrotic tissue from her brain. The bullet had passed through Gifford’s head without crossing the midline of the brain, where the most critical injuries typically result. Part of her skull was removed to avoid further damage to the brain from pressure caused by swelling. She was then placed in an induced coma to allow her brain to rest. She was able to respond to simple commands when periodically awoken but was unable to speak as she was on a ventilator.

By January 11^th her sedation had been reduced and she could breathe on her own and the next day she was able to open her eyes and see her visitor, President Barack Obama. Shortly after the shootings, however, some questions were raised by the media as to whether she could be removed from office under a state law that allows a public office is to be declared vacant if the officeholder is absent for three months. A spokesperson for the Arizona secretary of state said the statute “doesn’t apply to federal offices”.

It wasn’t until March 12^th that she had improved enough for her husband to feel secure in advising her that six other people had been killed although he did not, at that time, tell her who they were. By late April, her doctors reported that her physical, cognitive, and language production abilities had improved to the point that she could be placed in the top five percent of patients recovering from similar injuries. She was walking under supervision with perfect control of her left arm and leg, and able to write with her left hand. In addition she was able to read and understand, and spoke in short phrases.  By May she was able to travel to Kennedy Space Center to watch the launch of the final flight of Space Shuttle Endeavour, which was commanded by her husband Mark Kelly. By June an aide announced that her comprehension appeared to be “close to normal, if not normal”, but she was not yet using complete sentences.

Following intensive rehabilitation treatments in both Houston, Texas and Asheville, North Carolina, she continued to improve to the extent that and she was able to show up for the all-important vote on raising the debt ceiling on August 1^st and she and her husband participated in  a recent TV interview. In his memoir, her husband reported that Giffords vows to return to Congress, although she continues to struggle with language and has lost fifty percent of her vision in both eyes.

Sourced by Wikipedia

Sandra Day O'Connor

A Biography of Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O'Connor

By Judy Hedding, About.com Guide

The people of Phoenix, Arizona were indeed proud of one of their own when Sandra Day O'Connor was named to the U.S. Supreme Court. It shouldn't surprise anyone that was involved in some controversial decisions while serving in that position. While not everyone agreed with her opinions and assessments, no one questions her diligence and integrity. Sandra Day O'Connor may not be flamboyant or attention seeking, but she is very powerful and well-respected.

Sandra Day O'Connor was the first woman and the 102nd person to sit on the Supreme Court of the United States. Born in El Paso, Texas in 1930, she spent her early childhood on the sprawling family ranch in Southeastern Arizona. Her parents decided to send her back to El Paso to live with her grandmother when she became of school age. Her grandmother, Mamie Scott Wilkey, is said to have had the greatest influence upon Sandra.

Sandra Day majored in economics at Stanford University and graduated with high honors. She continued her graduate work there. It was during her work as editor on the Stanford Law Review that she met John Jay O'Connor III, also attending law school at Stanford. In 1952 she graduated from law school, again with honors, and soon thereafter was married to John O'Connor. Despite her excellent scholastic record, it was difficult for women to find positions as lawyers. Her husband practiced law for a few years before they decided to build a home in north Phoenix. Their first child, Scott, was born in 1957. Two more sons joined the family in 1960 and 1962. In 1965, Sandra Day O'Connor went to work on a part-time basis for the Arizona attorney general's office. In 1969 she was appointed to the state Senate and was subsequently re-elected to that position. In 1973 Sandra Day O'Connor was the first woman to serve as the majority leader of a state Senate.

In 1974 Sandra Day O'Connor was elected to a position of trial judge for Maricopa County and 5 years later was appointed by then Governor Bruce Babbitt to the Court of Appeals. On July 7, 1981 President Reagan announced that Sandra Day O'Connor was his appointee to fill the vacancy on the Supreme Court left by Associate Justice Potter Stewart's retirement. He was determined to follow through on his commitment to include women in high places of authority and importance. Sandra was a relative unknown, having spent most of her life in the West and having never served in the federal judicial system. Conservatives were not particularly happy with his choice, since she had taken a rather moderate position on abortion in the past. During her appointment hearings, O'Connor would not reveal how she would vote if a repeal of Roe Vs. Wade was put before her, nor would she speculate on any other issues. She was confirmed by a Judiciary Committee vote of 17 to 1 and won approval by the U.S. Senate by a vote of 99 to 0.

Justice O'Connor's first major case came in 1982. In this case about sex discrimination she wrote the opinion that a male student could not be rejected from a nursing school because of his gender. She received the most attention, however, for a case in 1989, Webster vs. Reproductive Health Services which restricted access to abortions in certain cases. Justice O'Connor was the deciding vote. The 5 to 4 decision upheld the law giving states the right to make specific abortion decisions. Conservatives had hoped that her swing vote in this case would lead to further restrictions on abortions and a repeal of the famous Roe Vs. Wade. Justice O'Connor would not go that far, however, and Roe vs. Wade has not been overturned.

During her legal career, Sandra Day O'Connor had a reputation for being cold and humorless. Justice O'Connor was regarded as a consummate compromiser; her goal on issues was simply to achieve a majority vote. She is considered to be tough and is a conservative, but not as tough or conservative when it comes to women's rights and children. O'Connor made it clear that she believes a court's role, including that of the Supreme Court, is to interpret and not to legislate. She has been referred to as the most influential woman in America.

A high school in Glendale, Arizona, just northwest of Phoenix, was named for her. Opened in 2002, The Supreme Court Justice attended the Sandra Day O'Connor High School dedication ceremony.

In July 2005 Sandra Day O'Connor announced that she would retire from her position as a Supreme Court Justice as soon as a replacement was appointed. Justice Samuel Alito succeeded her on January 31, 2006. In 2006 Arizona State University in Tempe honored Justice O'Connor by renaming their law school the Sandra Day O'Connor College of Law. I am told that the logo for the Sandra Day O'Connor College of Law includes 25-1/2 olive leaves for every year she served as a Supreme Court Justice.

John J. O'Connor III, her husband, was diagnosed with Alzheimer's Disease in 1990. He passed away on November 11, 2009.

Quotes from Sandra Day O'Connor

"The more education a woman has, the wider the gap between men's and women's earnings for the same work."

"The power I exert on the court depends on the power of my arguments, not on my gender."

"It is difficult to discern a serious threat to religious liberty from a room of silent, thoughtful schoolchildren."

DIANE SAWYER

Submitted by Bernice Zubrinsky 

 EARLY LIFE AND EDUCATION

Born in Glasgow, Kentucky, Diane Sawyer is the daughter of Jean W. Sawyer – an elementary school teacher – and Erbon Powers "Tom" Sawyer, a judge.^[1] Soon after her birth, her family moved to Louisville, Kentucky, where her father rose to local prominence as a Republican politician and community leader; he was Kentucky's Jefferson County Judge/Executive when he was killed in a car accident on Louisville's Interstate 64 in 1969

During the period from 1962–1965, Sawyer was "America's Junior Miss" touring the country to promote the Coca-Cola Pavilion at the 1964-1965 New York World's Fair.

In 1967, she received a bachelor of arts degree with a major in English from Wellesley College in Wellesley, Massachusetts. There, she was a member of the Wellesley College Blue Notes, an A Capella group and Phi Sigma Lecture Society. She attended one semester of law school at the University of Louisville before turning to journalism.

CAREER

Sawyer began her professional career in Republican Party politics. In 1970, White House Press Secretary Ron Ziegler hired her to serve in the administration of U.S. President Richard Nixon. Sawyer continued through Nixon's resignation from the presidency in 1974 and worked on the Nixon-Ford transition team in 1974–1975, after which she decamped with Nixon to California and helped him write his memoirs, published in 1978. She also helped prepare Nixon for his famous set of television interviews with journalist David Frost in 1977.^[2]

Years later, Sawyer would be suspected of being Deep Throat, the source of leaks of classified information to journalist Bob Woodward during the Watergate scandal. In 2005 Deep Throat was identified as W. Mark Felt, but prior to that, Rabbi Baruch Korff – a longtime Nixon confidant and defender known as "Nixon's rabbi" – said on his deathbed that he believed Sawyer was Deep Throat. Sawyer laughed it off, and she was one of six people to request and receive a public denial from Woodward.^[3][4]

In 1978, Sawyer joined CBS News as a political correspondent and became a co-anchor, with Bill Kurtis, of the CBS Morning News in 1981. In 1984, she became a correspondent for 60 Minutes, a CBS News investigative television newsmagazine; she remained for five years.

 In 1989, she moved to ABC News to co-anchor newsmagazine Primetime Live, with Sam Donaldson. From 1998 to 2000, she would become a co-anchor for ABC's 20/20, also a newsmagazine, co-anchoring on Wednesdays with Donaldson and on Sundays with Barbara Walters.

In 1999, Sawyer returned to morning news (GMA), under a lucrative contract^{[citation needed]}, as the co-anchor of GMA with Charles Gibson. The assignment was putatively temporary, but her success in the position, measured by a close in the gap with front-runner Today, NBC News's morning program, sustained her in the position far longer than anticipated.

On September 2, 2009, she was announced as the successor to Gibson, who retired as ABC World News anchor on Friday, December 18, 2009. The New York Times reported that instead of moving to ABC World News in January 2010, Sawyer would start on December 21, 2009, three days after Gibson's departure. Ratings jumped 8% for 60 days after her first four weeks, averaging 8.8 million viewers.

PERSONAL LIFE

On April 29, 1988, she and Mike Nichols, a film director, were married. They have no children. Nichols has 3 from previous marriages: Max, born in 1973; Daisy, born in 1974; and Jenny, born in 1977. Sawyer had previously had relationships with Frank Gannon, a Nixon aide, and Richard Holbrooke, a U.S diplomat.^[12] Forbes reported that she made $12 million in 2005.  

According to an article posted on bigjournalism.com, written by Pam Meister on 3/01/10, Sawyer is said to command a salary of between $12 and $15 million per year for anchoring ABC World News. 

NOTABLE INTERVIEWS (SELECTED)

Sawyer has interviewed many political figures including U.S. Presidents George W. Bush and Barack Obama. She conducted the first interview with U.S. President Bill Clinton and First Lady Hillary Rodham Clinton after his first election to the presidency in 1992.^[8]

On February 12, 2007, she interviewed Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. Her interview^{[clarification needed]} with Iraqi PresidentSaddam Hussein was his first Western television interview in a decade.

She has  interviewed:

Julia Morgan, architect

by Rita Salner

Julia Morgan was born in San Francisco, Ca., in 1872.  She was raised in Oakland, Ca., and went on to graduate from the University of California, Berkeley, in 1894 with a degree in civil engineering.  She furthered her studies at Ecole des Beaux-Arts in Paris.  She was the first woman to graduate from that school with a degree in architecture.

Upon graduation, she went to work for San Francisco architect John Galen Howard who was supervising the University of California Master Plan.  She worked on several buildings on the Berkeley campus, including the Hearst Mining Building and the Hearst Greek Theatre.  In 1904 she opened her own office in San Francisco.

Julia Morgan's philosophy was to "design a structure that works well with the surrounds and pleases the client".   Her most famous client was William Randolph Hearst.  She designed the Los Angeles Examiner Building and, in 1919 began work on La Cuesta Encando, commonly known as The Hearst Castle.  She spent more than two decades on the castle, supervising work on the weekends, and spending the week days designing other buildings  in her San Francisco office.  Part of her brilliance was in being able to work on several disparate projects simultaneously.

Her work for the Hearst family included designing the buildings at Wyntoon, four buildings on 50,000 acres near Mt. Shasta for Randolph Hearst's mother, and the Asilomar Conference Center in Monterey, Ca., which was to be the Y.W.C.A. summer conference center.  (Phoebe Apperson Hearst recommended her for this position).  She then went on to design Y.W.C.A. buildings in southern and northern Ca.

Morgan used her engineering knowledge to design the first bell tower on a United States college campus when she designed El Campanil for Mills College.

She received acclaim when the tower was unscathed by the 1906 earthquake. She went on to design five other buildings for Mills College.

She also used her engineering knowledge when she was hired to repair and restore the Fairmont Hotel after the 1906 earthquake. 

Julia Morgan died in 1957 at the age of 85.  in 2008 she was inducted into  the California Hall of Fame, part of The California Museum for History, Women and the Arts. 

Julia Morgan never married.  Her legacies are the many buildings which she designed, and which are still standing today.

Sources: wikipedia, The Quiet Pioneer by John Celio for Art History