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but this one struck home with me because she went to Jordan Marsh
Department store to “equalize” the dining room. As was the custom
then, there was a special dining area for men. They were quickly
seated and quickly served while women… many of them working women
such as I with short lunch hours…had to wait in line, looking at empty
seats in the men’s section. Roxcy got what she came for.
Her clinching argument: “Men and women sleep together; why can’t
they eat together?”
Roxcy
was not a working woman in the business sense. She stayed
home and cared for her husband and three children but she fought
for working women. In 1970 my photographer and I went with
her when she tackled the EEOC. Here was the federal agency
with a mandate to promote equal opportunity in employment and eliminate
discrimination in the workplace yet not only was it headed by a
man but all the investigators were men. After Roxcy’s visit,
that changed.
It
was not only working women whom Roxcy championed. She was
very aware of the plight of abused women and the domestic violence
that was, in effect, generally ignored by the police and government.
Roxcy took the problem to heart and founded Women in Distress and
secured a downtown shelter for abused women. I did a TV story
on it when Roxcy was scrounging for food for her “tenants”…at that
time several women and three or four children who had no place else
to go. Roxcy was a one-woman organization, running that home
in addition to her own. It was a dramatic move to make the
community wake up and take notice of the problem. Women in
distress was the first such shelter in the state.
Another
abuse that hardly anyone even talked about, much less did anything
about, was rape. Victims brave enough to report to police
were often treated callously and few in authority recognized or
tried to deal with the trauma suffered by rape victims. But
Roxcy wasn’t afraid to talk about it. And she did it publicly
with a march against rape down Flagler Street. She buttonholed
local officials at every opportunity and finally persuaded them
that something had to be done. The result was a special Rape
Treatment Center at Jackson Memorial Hospital with its own doctor
and staff. I remember being there with my camera when it was
opened and was honored to be the emcee for the ceremony in 1993
when it was named for Roxcy Bolton.
When
I think of how determined and inventive and dramatic Roxcy was when
she was out to right a wrong, I remember her visit to the president
of the University of Miami, Dr. Henry King Stanford in 1975.
He had been avoiding her for some time. She alerted me that
she was going over without an appointment and I knew it would be
a lively visit, so I want with my photographer. When we arrived,
there was Roxcy in the waiting room, with a bedroll and a picnic
hamper, prepared to spend the night or however long it took to see
him! Needless to say, she did see him and laid out her argument
for more women as department heads and equal salaries for men and
women doing the same jobs.
Roxcy
was not a woman of her time…she created her time. She blazed
a trail…put the spotlight on women…showcased their problems…and
encouraged other women to take action and expand the fight for equal
rights.
She
is a remarkable woman…a formidable adversary, a persistent advocate,
a woman of courage and conviction who is not afraid to go it alone
if need be…and she is a loyal and staunch friend.
Florida
is a much better place for women…and men…because Roxcy Bolton widened
the gate to equality.
Molly Turner
Coral Gables, Florida
January 25, 1994
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