From National Women's History Project

National Women's History Project : History helps us learn who we are, but when we don't know our own history, our power and dreams are immediately diminished. In 1980, the National Women's History Project (NWHP) was founded in Santa Rosa, California by Molly Murphy MacGregor, Mary Ruthsdotter, Maria Cuevas, Paula Hammett and Bette Morgan to broadcast women's historical achievements. Learn about the start of women's history month - that began as a week - which wasn't established until 1987!

From SF Gate

This year, National Women's History Month falls during a time of enormous turbulence and fear. The global economic meltdown is drastically reshaping our financial landscape and altering the way we live.

Although the economy has dominated our consciousness, debates and airwaves for months, little attention is being paid to the fact that women are disproportionately bearing the brunt of this crisis. Equally ignored is the fact that women have the solutions to get us out of it.

Consider the facts:

In California, women make up 68 percent of minimum- wage workers, making them especially vulnerable.

In the United States, the subprime mortgage crisis is taking a higher toll on women: 32 percent of women borrowers hold sub-prime mortgages, compared with 24 percent of men.

From Bitch Magazine

By now, if you've read any of my posts, you probably know that I'm a little bit of a Russophile. So when it was my turn to write this week's Adventures in Feministory, there was no doubt in my mind that I wanted to talk about the Soviet Union's 588th Night Bomber Regiment during World War Two.

This particular regiment (along with 2 others) was pioneered by pilot, Major Marina Mikhailovna Raskova (above, right), and was composed entirely of women-from the pilots to the mechanics and from the officers to the bomb loaders. The women of the 588th were feared greatly enough on the western front that they were dubbed 'The Night Witches' (Nachthexen) by the Germans who suffered their attacks.

The 588th, was the most highly-decorated unit in the Soviet Air Force-each pilot flew over 1,000 missions, twenty-three were awarded the Hero of the Soviet Union title. Thirty-one of its members died in combat.

As you can imagine, they didn't have the greatest support from their male colleagues, one of whom was quoted as saying: 'Wow! You even have political officers! Just like in a real unit?'. Lovely-they put their lives on the line for their country just as their male counterparts, and that's the support they got.

From Washington Post

As part of her continued campaign to focus on military families, first lady Michelle Obama visited the Women's Memorial at Arlington National Cemetery today, where she thanked women for their years of service in the U.S. military and said she was honored and "deeply moved" by her meetings with military families in recent years.

"Military families have done their duty, and we as a grateful nation must do ours. We must do everything in our power to honor them by supporting, not just by word but by deed," said Obama, adding that her visit to the cemetery was her first event to help commemorate Women's History Month.

Military families, Obama said, "are mothers and fathers who have lost their beloved children to war. They are husbands and wives keeping the family on track while their wives and husbands are deployed on duty. They are grandparents, aunts and uncles, sisters and brothers who are taking care of children while their moms and dads in uniform are away."