Women Strike for Peace webinar

Fifty years ago, on November 1, 1961, tens of thousands of women across the United States took to the streets calling for “an end to the arms race, not the human race.”  They called themselves Women Strike for Peace (WSP).  Some were moms who sent their children’s baby teeth to be checked for levels of strontium 90 being spewed from atmospheric nuclear tests. WSP women watched and wondered whether the world would make it through the 1961 Berlin Airlift Crisis and then the 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis.

After the initial strike, WSP kept marching, lobbying, gathering petitions and acting out in ways that  were new to most of these women in the early 60’s. Two years after the November 1st actions, the Partial Test Ban Treaty was ratified banning atmospheric nuclear testing. The Kennedy administration credited Women Strike for Peace in pushing toward this achievement. Energized by this victory and knowing that there was much left to do to achieve peace and security, WSP continued to work for an end to all nuclear weapons testing – naming this as their key unfinished business. WSP also focused efforts on ending the Vietnam war, and by the 1980’s they (like WAND) were calling attention to excessive military spending and, in particular, the “Star Wars” missile defense plans. WSP women leaders like Bella Abzug and Coretta Scott King went on to be active participants in the rising feminist and civil rights movements.

WAND hosted a webinar on November 17th to celebrate the anniversary of Women Strike for Peace and to explain why the history of WSP is still so important.

The power point presentation can be found here: Women Strike for Peace

Some additional resources on Women Strike for Peace can be found here:

Blog posting by WAND board member, Vanessa Lawrow, on 50 years of Women Strike for Peace

Op-ed by Kathy Robinson on the anniversary of the signing of the CTBT

Blog posting by Sayre Sheldon on Dagmar Wilson