Dorothy Pitman Hughes – activist, co-founder of Ms. Magazine and overall icon – spent a day split into 3 parts discussing social issues with the community of Long Beach City College on May 2 thanks to the help of Trustee Virginia Baxter, counselor Debra Petersen and a few generous donors and event organizers.
“This all started with a phone call,” Debra Petersen said.
Possibly most recognized for her 1971 portrait in Esquire magazine with famed feminist Gloria Steinem, Dorothy Pitman Hughes’ true work was in was in child advocacy and women’s rights which began early on in her life.
The first stop of the day was set up as a question and answer discussion to introduce the group to Hughes’ feminist philosophy along with her collaborator of thirty plus years, Dr. Judi Herring, a former Marine Captain and current surgeon.
The tables in room T-1311 were pushed aside to create a circle of chairs for a group of about forty students, staff and faculty who sat facing towards one another as Hughes described the start of her activism.
“I got in the women’s movement at the age of 8. I found my university sitting under the porch hearing the women of my community talk. That’s how I got to know what was contributing pain to the community. That’s how I became the fighter I am now,” Hughes said.
Born in Lumpkin, a small town in Georgia, Hughes family stayed satiated by planting crops and raising pigs.
She explained to the circle that because Lumpkin was segregated, instead of receiving U.S. currency, the black population were given a currency coined ‘bozine’ to use in the shops in town.
“It was sad, but I grew up listening to the complaints of the women. I just thought it was my job to make a change,” Hughes said.
After graduating high school, Hughes got on a bus and moved to New York where she found jobs cleaning homes and singing in jazz clubs, all while simultaneously being an activist.
“I got taught by the process about how to become an advocate for myself,” Hughes said.
Hughes began caring for battered women when she rented a room in an apartment for them to stay when they needed a break from the abuse they were dealing with in their lives.
After seeing the state of the children who lived in her community, Hughes began a daycare center from one room in her home that eventually led her to owning and operating three daycare centers, along with co-founding New York City’s Agency for Child Development in 1979.
“I just started organizing without people knowing I was organizing. I knew if someone needed me, especially a child, I was going to be there for them,” Hughes said.
During the second community talking circle in the bistro, Hughes turned her attention back to the current state of children in America, including its borders.
“Right now, children are being trained for prison. We need to get involved and quickly. It’s really sad to see young children arrested and put into a situation where they can’t go home. We are responsible for the pain of the children who are being kept out of this country,” Hughes said.
President of the Women’s club and history major Sasha Ramirez spoke to the circle about her community and how her friends were beginning to be displaced.
Hughes personally gave her number to Ramirez and told her, “there is no problem that can’t be solved”.
While Hughes was beginning her lifelong career of activism, Long Beach City College welcomed Betty Friedan, writer of The Feminine Mystique, to speak to the campus’ community during the second wave of feminism.
“In 1965 Betty Friedan came to LBCC. This is full circle of what has happened within the feminist movement as shortly after that Ms. Magazine was founded,” Virginia Baxter said when speaking on the importance of having Hughes on campus.
Betty Friedan’s 1963 book strongly emphasized the thought that false social beliefs force women to lose their identities in their families and husbands.
As women began to raise their voices to the sound of equality, Hughes co-founded Ms. Magazine in 1972 along with Gloria Steinem, which would be just one of their many ventures together.
The magazine is online today and continues to pursue stories with the interest of advocacy for women’s rights with a focus on intersectional and international women’s rights.
“There’s enormous power in women. Women will never fix the patriarchy until they fix the racism between them,” said Hughes when describing her time touring with Steinem throughout the 1970’s and their joint ventures through the decades.
The History of American Women Class had the chance to be inspired by Hughes at her third and final stop of the day.
The class, currently taught by Professor Crispin Peralta, has been offered at LBCC for almost 40 years.
“It is a rare opportunity to meet someone we read about in the history books and I am sure it will stick with the students for a long time to come,” said Peralta.
Hughes spent the day highlighting the importance of starting a life of activism within your own community by seeing who needs help and providing that care regardless of the circumstances.
She recently invested in her home town of Lumpkin, Georgia and is in the process of renaming the street signs and rebuilding the infrastructure.
“I’m still organizing, I’m still getting things done. This phase of my life is trying to save lives, there is no reason for the things going on and I’m not ashamed to ask for help,” said Hughes.
It was announced in late 2018 that singer and actress Janelle Monáe will be portraying Hughes in a biopic based on Gloria Steinem’s biography The Glorias: A Life On The Road.
