One morning in February 2021, Nkwanda Jah wrote to me and said she was having many thoughts about the women who had died who had influenced her and taught her how to be an activist. She wanted to brainstorm how to honor these women for Women’s History Month. We talked and decided on 10 women who fit that category. We hired a graphic artist, Tanisha Byars, and started writing to women we knew who had known one of the women and asked if they could write a short tribute to that woman. That’s how Kim Barton came to write the tribute to Barbara Higgins, who had worked at the Supervisor of Elections office for years and was instrumental in getting many black folks to register to vote. Vivian Filer wrote about Verdell Robinson, because they were both nursing professors at Santa Fe College. And so on. We hope to be a cog in the wheel of history that keeps these women alive in our collective memory.
In the struggle,
Pam Smith and Nkwanda Jah
