Browse the American Women collection

A panel discussion on the subject of "the new woman," with Stephanie Mills of Planned Parenthood, Mimi Kaprolat of the National Organization for Women (NOW), Patricia "Pat" Maginnis of the Association to Repeal Aborton Laws, and Alvin Duskin, San Francisco manufacturer of women's clothing. The evening was moderated by Eugene Schoenfeld, otherwise known in his San Francisco Chronicle column as Dr. Hip-pocrates. Schoenfeld is introduced by George Frankenstein, President of the Young Adults Division of the Jewish Welfare Federation, sponsors of the event. The first reel of this program contains the panel; the second reel contains the ensuing question-and-answer session.

Margo St. James (born September 12, 1937), a self-described prostitute and sex-positive feminist, founded the organization COYOTE (Call Off Your Old Tired Ethics), which advocates decriminalization of prostitution. In this recording she discusses her work with COYOTE with Jan Legnitto of KPFA. She discusses the one-sided laws concerning prostitution in the United States, whereby female prostitutes are punished for providing their services but their male customers are rarely criminalized. She explains why she is for decriminalizing, but not legalizing, prostitution, and how police crackdown on prostitution does nothing to prevent its occurrence and, in fact, reinforces the gender and class imbalances inherent in American society. The interview was recorded in 1973. Contains sensitive language.

This program examines the case of Alma Andrews, a Black woman and a nurse, charged with first-degree murder in San Francisco after defending herself against a Muni driver who attacked her with a razor in an apparent rape attempt. Contains interviews with Andrews herself; James McCready, Andrews' defense attorney; Dennis Chamberlain, the jury foreman; Pierre Merle, assistant district attorney for San Francisco; Rotea Gilford and Ernest Sanders, inspectors with San Francisco Police Department, and others. A special report produced for KPFA by Sheila McAleenan.

Lois Hansen, Ellen Dubrowin and Deborah Janone of KPFA visited executives at nine representative Bay Area radio and TV stations and asked them about the status of female employees there. Upon discovering the near-total lack of women in any but clerical positions, the KPFA women asked for descriptions of technical and on-air jobs, and tried to get some definitions of talent from the men who would be judging women applicants for it. As it became obvious that it would take women years to qualify, the KPFA women aksed the station executives what type of programming they feel that women in their audience want. The results of all of this were discouraging enough to conclude that women have more of a "plight" than a "status" in the broadcast industry. No intro or outro.