I’ve got something to say!
At my age, in this still hierarchical time, people often ask me if I’m “passing the torch.” I explain that I’m keeping my torch, thank you very much… and I’m using it to light the torches of others. Because only if each of us has a torch will there be enough light.
~ Gloria Steinem
The Awards honor women who have been working for the larger good their entire lives, in the tradition of those who sparked so many reforms in the aftermath of the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory Fire over one hundred years ago.
We honor—in the words of the poet Marge Piercy—people who:
jump into work headfirst
without dallying in the shadows…
who do what has to be done, again and again.
The Fourth Annual Clara Lemlich Awards were held Wednesday, April 2, 2014 at the Puffin Gallery for Social Activism at the Museum of the City of New York. Watch the video below and learn more about the honorees by clicking on the images to the right.
The 2014 Honorees
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Watch the 2014 Ceremony
Poem
Lady Freedom Among Us
don’t lower your eyes
or stare straight ahead to where
you think you ought to be going
don’t mutter oh no
not another one
get a job fly a kite
go bury a bone
with her old-fashioned sandals
with her leaden skirts
with her stained cheeks and whiskers and heaped up trinkets
she has risen among us in blunt reproach
she has fitted her hair under a hand-me-down cap
and spruced it up with feathers and stars
slung over her shoulder she bears
the rainbowed layers of charity and murmurs
all of you even the least of you
don’t cross to the other side of the square
don’t think another item to fit on a tourist’s agenda
consider her drenched gaze her shining brow
she who has brought mercy back into the streets
and will not retire politely to the potter’s field
having assumed the thick skin of this town
its gritted exhaust its sunscorch and blear
she rests in her weathered plumage
bigboned resolute
don’t think you can forget her
don’t even try
she’s not going to budge
no choice but to grant her space
crown her with sky
for she is one of the many
and she is each of us
Rita Dove, 1993
Who Was Clara Lemlich?
“I’VE GOT SOMETHING TO SAY” shouted the 23-year old Clara Lemlich in her native Yiddish during a tense, crowded meeting of garment workers in Cooper Union’s Great Hall in 1909. Rising from the audience, she interrupted Samuel Gompers and the other union leaders on stage. Her speech inspired the crowd, leading to an unexpected vote to strike, and to what would become known as the Uprising of 20,000.
Born to a Jewish family in the Ukraine, Lemlich migrated to the U.S. in 1903, found work in the garment industry, and soon became active in the International Ladies’ Garment Workers Union. The 1909 strike led to reforms—but the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory was a hold-out and did not implement safety improvements.
The fire that took 146 lives on March 25, 1911 was seen across the country as a tragedy that could have been avoided, and it sparked a movement that pushed politicians to accept a new notion about the responsibilities of government. Lemlich continued to be active in the labor movement until she was pushed out for her leftist politics. She continued to work for women’s suffrage, led a boycott of butcher shops to protest meat prices, campaigned for unemployment relief, and fought for tenants’ rights.
One hundred and three years later we are proud to honor her legacy and to honor those who follow proudly in her footsteps.