"Honors...are wonderful experiences. But they pass. The important thing is the work, that it lives on and grows." Rosalie Cohen, only woman to serve as president in the Jewish Federation of Greater New Orleans in the early 1960s; quote is from a New Orleans Times-Picayune newspaper article
The following is a small list of Louisiana women who have devoted their lives carving out a place in a man's world for themselves ... and for other women living in their lifetime. In doing so, they've enriched life for future generations of women - changing forever the beliefs, attitudes, and conception (or misconception) of female roles in day to day living for the betterment of womanhood.
Arts and Entertainment: Donna Douglas was born "Doris Smith" on September 26, 1939 in a small town in Louisiana. As a young girl she spent much of her time on her grandfather's farm developing into a real tomboy – climbing trees, swinging on vines and playing football and softball. After winning several beauty contests as a teenager, including the "Miss Baton Rouge" and "Miss New Orleans" crowns, she pursued a career in entertainment in New York. There she was featured as a "Letters Girl" on "The Perry Como Show" and a "Billboard Girl" on "The Steve Allen Show." These and other appearances led New York photographers and newspaper reporters to award her the "Miss By-line" crown, which she wore on "The Ed Sullivan Show." Producer Hal Wallis saw that telecast and brought Donna to Hollywood, casting her in the movie "Career" with Dean Martin and Shirley MacLaine. Roles in other movies, such as "Lil' Abner" and "Lover Come Back" followed, as well as roles in numerous television series.
The turning point in her budding career came when she was chosen over 500 other aspiring actresses to play the role of Elly May. "The Beverly Hillbillies" was the number one television series in the nation for two years, and it was in the top twenty the ninth year. Today it remains as one of the most popular shows in worldwide syndication. Ms. Douglas was extremely proud of "The Beverly Hillbillies" and her role as Elly May and is still known to do public appearances in her Hillbilly garb. She is also an accomplished gospel singer and an animal activist.
Business: The first statue erected in the United States in honor of a woman is the statue to Margaret Haughery at the corner of Prytania and Camp in New Orleans. This remarkable woman was a penniless Irish immigrant who lost her husband and child to the yellow fever epidemic soon after their arrival to New Orleans in 1835. From humble beginnings she grew into an astute businesswoman, entrepreneur and philanthropist who established four orphanages, several homes for the elderly, and at her death gave the bulk of her estate, over $600,000, to New Orleans' orphanages. She was well-known throughout the city for her charity and compassion and creative resourcefulness to provide for the city's needy children.
After establishing her first orphanage in a dilapidated house with the widespread reputation for being haunted, and after making it habitable, the owner wanted to evict them and sell the property. Margaret used her ingenuity and sincerity to convince the owner of the value of charity and for her efforts the orphanage was granted free rent from that day on. After this success, she purchased several cows to provide milk for the children and this purchase grew into a booming dairy whose products she sold through the city from her milk cart. Her investments and loans were highly profitable and her wealth grew. As a result of earlier loans to businessmen, she found herself to be the major stockholder of a bankrupt bakery which she transformed into a highly successful venture known as Margaret's Bakery (later the Klotz Cracker Factory).
She tended to the victims of the constant yellow fever epidemics in the city without consideration of race, religion, or class and her generosity was well-known throughout the city. After the epidemic of 1853 devastated so many homes and families, she was approached with the need for an orphanage for infants alone. Her answer was, "Build the asylum, and God will pay for it," and it was thus that St. Vincent dePaul Infant Asylum at Race and Magazine Streets was started. An imposing structure, the debt for the orphanage was paid off in sixteen years, largely through Margaret's milk cart sales.
Margaret died in 1882 and was greatly mourned. The crowd at her funeral stretched for a block outside the church doors and her pallbearers included former governors and mayors. All stores, city offices and business establishments were closed for the day in respect.
Education: Mrs. Frances Joseph-Gaudet was born in a log cabin in Holmesville, Mississippi, of African American and Native American heritage. She was raised by her grandparents and lived with her brother in New Orleans where she went to public and private schools and attended Straight College. Widowed early, she dedicated her life to social work and worked with the Prison Reform Association assisting prisoners unjustly accused. Starting in 1894 she held prayer meetings, wrote letters, carried messages, and secured clothing for black prisoners and later for white inmates as well. Her never-ending encouragement and support of prisoners won the support of prison officials and city authorities, the governor, and the Prison Reform Association.
Upon her return from serving as a delegate to the Women's Christian Temperance Union international convention in Edinburgh, Scotland in 1900, she attended hearings of the juvenile court where she assumed responsibility for young blacks arrested for misdemeanor or vagrancy and worked toward their reform. She was the first woman, black or white, to support juvenile prisoners in Louisiana and her efforts helped found Juvenile Court. When her home grew too small for this endeavor, she purchased a farm on Gentilly Road and founded the Colored Industrial Home and School which later became the Gaudet Normal and Industrial School. The school was also a boarding school where working mothers could leave their children. Through various fundraising activities the school expanded to 105 acres with dormitories and many buildings.
Mrs. Gaudet was the principal of the school until 1921 when she gave the school to the diocese of the Protestant Episcopal church of Louisiana with the understanding that they would continue the school or, if sold, donate the proceeds to a similar school. In the 1950s the school closed, but in 1954 the Gaudet Episcopal Home opened in the same facility serving African American children ages four to sixteen. Although this home is now closed, the endowment continues to fund St. Luke's Community Center on N. Dorgenois Street which honors Mrs. Gaudet with a hall in her honor. Mrs. Frances Gaudet spent the last years of her life in Chicago, Illinois, where she died in December 1934.
Media: Andrea Clesi, Baton Rouge's Channel 2 News co-anchor, began her career at WBRZ as an intern in May of 1977 before working her way up through the ranks to a full-time reporter and news anchor. Being a native of Baton Rouge, Andrea has an advantage over many reporters in that she is familiar with many aspects of the local community. She has covered a wide variety of important topics from education to government. Andrea is a graduate of St. Joseph's Academy and the LSU School of Journalism.
She devotes many hours to community service. Andrea serves on the board at the Manship School of Mass Communication and the Woman's Hospital Advisory Board. She has held offices of vice president and president of St. Joseph's Academy Alumni Association and served on the board of directors for the Junior League of Baton Rouge. Andrea has even coached basketball for the YMCA.
Numerous honors have been awarded to Andrea for her reporting, including the Kennedy Foundation Award for coverage of the Special Olympics and the Louisiana Association of Education Award for educational reporting. Andrea was a spokesperson for Buckle Up For Tony, a public service campaign aimed at saving lives by addressing seat belt safety issues. The idea was developed in response to the death of Gathian "Tony" Fertitta, her only son. In the summer of 1998, Tony was killed in a traffic accident near Clinton, Louisiana. It was later discovered that he was riding in the front passenger seat and did not have his seat belt fastened when the accident occurred.
Because of the campaign, Andrea has received a variety of awards. She has been honored with the Woman of Achievement Award, Good Citizenship Medal, Distinguished Family Award and a Public Safety Award. Her highest honor was a public service award from the President of the United States and the Department of Transportation.
Military: Born in Marksville, Louisiana, Brigadier General (Retired) Sherian Grace Cadoria has led a distinguished 29-year military career. Upon her retirement in 1990, Cadoria was the highest-ranking black woman in the United States Forces and one of only four female Army generals.
Cadoria's appointment to Brigadier General is only one of many accomplishments. She currently shares her leadership skills in many community, state and national boards and activities. She has been recognized as one of the Top 10 Black Business and Professional Women, and has received the NAACP's Roy Wilkens Meritorious Service Award. She is also president of her own company and is currently serving as volunteer principal of Marksville Catholic School.
Cadoria's journey through life began in the cotton fields of the South, raised by her mother, who she considered to be her first real sergeant. Her mother's strict discipline made military life feel like home. She recalls an incident where her mother made Cadoria walk with her siblings back to a store, five miles away, because they received a penny too much in change.
It was during her junior year at Southern University in Baton Rouge that she was selected by the Women's Army Corps to represent the university at the College Junior Program. Cadoria always knew she would join the military, and this experience gave her a glimpse of what lay ahead. She spent four weeks at Fort McClellen in the summer of 1960 and experienced first hand the life of an enlisted soldier.
From January 1967 to October 1969, Cadoria served in Vietnam. Everywhere she went she was assigned more than one job. Cadoria said she didn't mind because she was given jobs that were not normally given to women. She held key assignments in many facets of government, while at the same time working to earn a Master of Arts degree in Social Work from the University of Oklahoma. It was in 1985 that she was promoted to Brigadier General.
Being a black female in a predominantly white male community never phased Cadoria.
"I've gotten more pressure from being female in a man's world than from being black. I was always a role model. I had responsibility not just for black women but for black men as well," she said. "A woman today has to do more than her male counterpart. I came in knowing I was going to have to give 200 percent effort to get 100 percent credit. Most of the time you don't even get the 100 percent credit."
Politics: Lindy Boggs learned about government and politics by living with it daily for years before taking office herself. Prior to becoming the first woman from Louisiana to serve in the U.S. House of Representatives, Lindy lived in Washington D.C. with her late husband, Congressman Hale Boggs, who died in an airplane crash in 1972. Following his death, she won his vacant congressional seat during a special election and was reelected to that position on her own merits eight times until her retirement in 1990.
She served as president of the Woman's National Democratic Club, the Democratic Wives' Forum and the Congressional Club and chaired two national democratic conventions. She chaired the inaugural committees for President Kennedy and President Johnson and co-chaired Lady Bird Johnson's whistlestop campaign. While raising three children, she also worked closely with her husband in his office.
In 1997, President Clinton appointed Lindy to be the U.S. Ambassador to the Vatican. Ambassador Boggs was the first woman to receive the Tulane University Distinguished and Outstanding Alumni Award in 1985 and was the first to receive the Congressional Award of the Veterans of Foreign Wars in March of 1986. Ambassador Boggs' other honors include the first AMVETS Auxiliary National Humanitarian Award, the Eleanor Roosevelt Centennial Award, the National Housing Conference's Housing Person of the Year Award, the National Advertising Council's Distinguished Service Award, the Bess Wallace Truman Award, the Former Members of Congress Distinguished Service Award, the National Science Foundation Distinguished Public Service Award, the first annual International Women's Forum Award, the Notre Dame University Laetare Medal, the 1994 American Mother of the Year, and the Louisiana library Association's Literary Award for her book Washington Through a Purple Veil.
Sports: Clifford Ann Creed, the first woman elected to the Louisiana Sports Hall of Fame, had a brillant pro golf career. Creed was the state amateur women's golf champion five times, including four straight titles from 1956 through 1959. An Alexandria native, she was a Curtis Cup player in 1962 before turning pro in 1963. She was the women pro tour's rookie of the year that season and fifth in money winnings.
Clifford Ann finished in the top 10 in money winnings on the pro tour for six consecutive years while winning 11 LPGA tournament championships and one team tournament in the 1960s.
Women's Suffrage: One of the first pioneers in the Louisiana women's suffrage and temperance movements, Caroline Merrick was born to a prominent family in East Feliciana Parish and married Judge Edwin T. Merrick whose career would eventually take him to New Orleans. During the late 1870s she began to involve herself in civic activities, including serving on the board for St. Anna's Asylum in New Orleans, an institute for poor women and children run entirely by women. In 1878 a German woman inmate revealed that she had $1000 dollars and on her deathbed wrote a will giving the money to the Asylum that had sheltered her. When the will was probated, it was found to not be "worth the paper it is written on" because it was witnessed by "incapables." Those judged incapable to witness a legal document were "women, insane, idiots, and felons."
Spurred by the injustice of losing this money, Caroline and Elizabeth Lyle Saxon drew up a petition to present to the state constitutional convention that was meeting in New Orleans in 1879. The two women secured over four hundred signatures for their petition and Caroline Merrick's speech to the full convention won much acclaim. The matter caused a sensation, received often positively even in remote parishes.
While the convention granted them only a minor concession, granting women 21 years of age or older eligibility for office of control and management on school boards, it was the start of further women's movement activities involving suffrage, social reform, improved child labor laws, etc. The following decade of church societies, temperance unions, and women's clubs would empower women to step outside their narrowly defined societal roles and agitate for change.
During this period Mrs. Merrick was instrumental in temperance work, inviting nationally known leader Frances Willard to speak in New Orleans. Willard felt she was a "lady who can make the W.C.T.U. a success, even in the volatile city of Mardi Gras." Merrick began a ten year term as president of the local W.C.T.U., and within several years saw the growth of similar organizations around the state. She became president of the National W.C.T.U. in 1882. In 1892 she organized the Portia Club devoted to the study of the legal rights of women and children who later joined the Era Club to gain the right for female taxpayers to vote on tax issues.
