Talking About Women’s History: Three Questions and an Answer from Marlene Trestman
I’ve met the most amazing women hanging out on the Internet. Case in point: Marlene Trestman.
For the last decade of her thirty-year career with the Maryland Attorney General’s Office, from which she retired in 2013, Marlene Trestman served as Special Assistant to the Attorney General. Recognized for her enforcement of laws governing consumer protection and public health, Trestman twice received the Attorney General’s Exceptional Service Award. A Phi Beta Kappa graduate and former trustee of Goucher College, Trestman earned her law degree from George Washington University and her MBA from Loyola University of Maryland, where she has taught law. For her writing, Trestman has received research funding from the National Endowment for the Humanities, Supreme Court Historical Society, Hadassah-Brandeis Institute, American Jewish Archives, and Texas Jewish Historical Society.
Trestman’s biography of her mentor, Fair Labor Lawyer: The Remarkable Life of New Deal Attorney and Supreme Court Advocate Bessie Margolin (LSU Press, 2016), explores Margolin’s inspiring and improbable journey from the New Orleans Jewish orphanage in which she was raised, through the New Deal and the Nazi war crimes trials at Nuremberg, to the United States Supreme Court in which she championed the Fair Labor Standards Act.
A New Orleans native, Trestman lives in Baltimore where she is writing her second book, Most Fortunate Unfortunates: New Orleans’s Jewish Orphans’ Home, 1855-1946 (LSU Press, forthcoming).
Take it away, Marlene:
What led you to write your biography of Bessie Margolin?
Bessie Margolin and I are products of Southern Jewish benevolence, and our stories are interwined. Following the death of her mother, Bessie Margolin spent her childhood in New Orleans’s Jewish Orphans’ Home. In 1903, a decade before Bessie was admitted, the orphanage’s trustees founded the Isidore Newman Manual Training School to provide its wards a rigorous secular education that would equip them with practical skills and academic knowledge for a self-sufficient life. The School’s most unique feature was that it also admitted children from the broader community, regardless of religion or gender, whose parents paid tuition. The school quickly became what it remains today, a prestigious college prep school.
In 1967, two decades after the Home closed and Newman School became an independent entity, I was orphaned and placed in foster care under the supervision of the orphanage’s successor, today known as the Jewish Children’s Regional Service. At JCRS’s request, Newman School admitted me on a full scholarship, honoring the school’s founding mission to educate Jewish orphans.
In 1974, as I was about to graduate from Newman to attend Goucher College, the school’s guidance counselor wrote a letter introducing me to Bessie Margolin, who had recently retired from her remarkable career as Associate Solicitor of the U.S. Department of Labor, where for more than three decades she had championed the Fair Labor Standards Act and the Equal Pay Act in courts across the nation, including the United State Supreme Court. In the letter, the counselor suggested that Margolin might like to get to know me as Margolin and I shared childhood experiences as wards of the Home and as Newman graduates. Soon after I arrived in Baltimore, Margolin graciously began inviting me for weekend visits to her lovely home in Washington, D.C., and our wonderful relationship continued through my years in college, law school, and into the start of my own career as a government attorney.
Margolin, the first woman lawyer I ever met, was elegant, worldly, and kind. She provided helpful advice, captivating recollections of her career, important contacts in the legal community, and was a powerful role model for me. After she died at age 87 in 1996, and after my repeated and unsuccessful efforts to find a “real author” to tell her remarkable story, I slowly realized there was no one else to do the job. Margolin deserved to be rescued from obscurity. Fortunately, LSU Press and the National Endowment for the Humanities agreed. And so with a publishing contract, prompted by grants from NEH and other funders, and a literary award from the Supreme Court Historical Society, I retired from my thirty-year law practice to become Bessie Margolin’s reluctant biographer.
Tell us about a woman or a group of women who inspired your writing.
The Feminist Legal Biography Workshop is a small but amazing group of writers, all of whom happen to be women academics in the field of legal history, who graciously welcomed me into their highly specialized fold and offered priceless feedback and expertise. We’ve met in person only once a year over the past 7-8 years, supplemented with occasional email. When we meet, there are usually six or seven of us in attendance, and each of us has one hour to present what we’re working on and seek input from the group. Each of us has written or is writing a book about a female jurist or lawyer: Barbara Babcock, biographer of Clara Folz, the first woman lawyer in the West and the first public defender; Constance Backhouse, biographer of Judge Claire L’Heureux-Dubé, Canada’s second female Supreme Court justice; Jane DeHart, Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s biographer; Tomiko Brown-Nagin, biographer of Constance Baker Motley, first female African American federal judge; Leandra Zarnow, biographer of Bella Abzug; and Pnina Lahav, biographer of Golda Meir.
And, yes, feminist legal biography is a real “thing.” Several of us gave a panel presentation on the subject at the 2019 conference of the American Society of Legal History and will also be on a panel at the upcoming Berkshire Conference of Women Historians. I feel so fortunate to be part of this inspirational group of women. As the only non-academic in the group, I am certain that Bessie Margolin’s importance paved the way for my participation.
What’s your next book and when will we see it?
I’m thrilled that LSU Press has decided to release Fair Labor Lawyer in paperback, so look for that in September 2020. I’m particularly excited to have gotten some new and enthusiastic “blurbs” for the paperback, including from Julie Cohen (award-winning director of the documentary, RBG), Evan Thomas (Justice Sandra Day O’Connor’s biographer), and Elaine Weiss (author of The Woman’s Hour: The Great Fight to Win the Vote).
My next new book, still very much a work in progress, is Most Fortunate Unfortunates: New Orleans’s Jewish Orphans’ Home, 1855-1946. I became so enthralled with learning about Bessie Margolin’s childhood in the orphanage, coupled with the knowledge that I would have lived there if it had not closed, that this was another book I was reluctantly compelled to write. There are days I feel I have bitten off far more than I can chew; over its 90 years, through the Civil War and WWII, the Home — which was the first purpose-built Jewish orphanage in the country — sheltered 1623 Jewish orphans and other dependent children (and 24 widows) from throughout the South. To date, with funding from the American Jewish Archives and the Texas Jewish Historical Society, I have conducted extensive archival research and have interviewed more than 60 Home alumni or their descendants, many of whom contacted me through my website, www.marlenetrestman.com. My manuscript is due to LSU Press in June 2020, and so the pressure is on!
Question for Pamela: What’s the most surprising thing you’ve learned while running Non-Fiction Fans? *
I think the thing that has surprised me most is how little running it actually requires. We went in expecting to have to nudge conversation along. In fact, the conversations happen without much intervention on our part. Non-fiction fans are a lively, opinionated and interesting group.
Want to know more about Marlene and her work?
Check out her website: www.marlenetrestman.com
Follow her on Twitter: https://twitter.com/MarleneTrestman
*For those of you who aren’t in the know, Non-Fiction Fans is a Facebook group that Theresa Kaminski and I run together. As you may have guessed, the purpose of the group is to readers (and writers) of mainstream narrative nonfiction to fabulous books (history, biography, literary studies, cultural studies)s and spark conversations about them. If you’re not already a member, drop on by: https://www.facebook.com/groups/1760137804315990/ (You will have to answer a few questions before we accepted you. We draw a large number of would-be members who can best be described as fruitcakes.)
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Come back tomorrow for three questions and an answer with Leah Leach of the Gal’s Guide to the Galaxy, an organization that is reaching for the women’s history stars.
Talking About Women’s History: Three Questions and an Answer with Kimberly Sherman
Dr. Kimberly B. Sherman is a member of the next wave of women’s historians. She is a historian, writer, and educator living in Wilmington, NC. She received her Ph.D. in Modern History from the University of St. Andrews. Her current book project is titled Intimate Worlds: Scottish families in early North Carolina and the Atlantic World.
You heard about her here first, folks. Take it away, Kimberly!
When did you first become interested in women’s history? What sparked that interest?
I think a lot of my interest in women’s history came right from my family. I’ve always said that spending time in my grandmother’s kitchen when I was little inspired my trajectory toward the field of history. She’d tell me stories about growing up in southeastern North Carolina as we made biscuits or cornbread together. Later on, when I actually got into studying history at university, I shied away from women’s history because I had been brainwashed with the idea that women were expected to do women’s history — so I resisted. In the end, I realized how distorted that mentality was and I fell headfirst into loving the field.
[Pamela butting in here: This statement tells me how far we have come in the last forty years: “ I had been brainwashed with the idea that women were expected to do women’s history.” I was blown away when I read that sentence. When I first began studying history, women’s history was brand new and controversial. Not only were women expected to do women’s history, but women were often warned away from it on the grounds that it might damage their careers. (I know of one woman whose dissertation committee asked “Isn’t that a little–soft?” when presented with her proposed topic.*) We have made more progress than we sometimes realize. Carry on.]
What do you find most challenging or most exciting about researching historical women?
One of the most challenging aspects is often the lack of sources written directly by women, especially from the eighteenth century and previous. So many women did not have the privilege of literacy or their personal documents have not been preserved in the same manner as the “great men” of history. So I guess that would be the silences of the archives and the challenge of sometimes having to read between the lines. At the same time, it can be incredibly thrilling when you find something you don’t expect!
What was the most surprising thing you’ve found doing historical research for your work?
Last summer I was conducting research as a fellow at the Winterthur Museum and Library in Delaware for a new project. After I had exhausted most of the collections I was interested in, I called up a volume that looked like it might be loosely related to my research on Scottish families in revolutionary North Carolina. It turned out to be a cyphering book (or mathematics exercise book) kept by a teenage girl from northeastern North Carolina in 1776. Every page of exercises was embellished with elaborate doodles and penmanship revealing a very political stance in support of revolution. It is a breathtaking volume and I can’t wait to uncover more about this young woman and her community!
And a question from Kimberly for Pamela: What do you think is the most under-researched topic or era in women’s history? What needs to be done?
The real answer is all of it! But if I have to chose: the most under researched topics are those related to women of color and non-elite women. I tiptoed into this area in Women Warriors because I wanted my global history to be truly global. It is challenging because even fewer traditional sources are available. But people are producing some exciting work in this field. Two recent examples I ‘m eager to get my hands on are A Black Women’s History of the United States by Daina Ramey Berry and Kali Nicole Gross and Rebel Cinderella: From Rags to Riches to Radical, the Epic Journey of Rose Pastor Stokes by Adam Hochschild. Exciting stuff!
Want to know more about Kimberly Sherman? Her writing may be found at www.kimberlybsherman.com .
*Feel free to growl, curse, or throw something.
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Come back tomorrow for three questions and an answer with attorney turned biographer Marlene Trestman.
Talking About Women’s History: More Than Three Answers and a Question with Sarah Rose
Sarah Rose is a journalist and bestselling author of D-Day Girls: The Spies Who Armed the Resistance, Sabotaged the Nazis and Helped Win World War II, and For All the Tea in China: How England Stole the World’s Favorite Drink and Changed History. A former news columnist at the Wall Street Journal, her feature writing appears in Outside, The New York Post, Travel + Leisure, Bon Appetit, The Saturday Evening Post, and Men’s Journal. Sarah is a graduate of Harvard College and the University of Chicago.
I’m pleased to have her here for what turned out to be seven questions and an answer!
How did you discover the women you write about in D-Day Girls?
I was interested in writing about women in the military – how do women operate in traditionally male spaces? When I asked the question “Who was the first woman in combat?” I discovered it was the women of SOE, the Special Operations Executive. And it wasn’t a new phenomenon, it was 75 years old and we had mostly forgotten their stories.
D-Day Girls tells the story of three fascinating women. Do you have a favorite among them?
I suppose I feel most strongly about Andree Borrel because she wasn’t able to tell us her story. Almost everything we have is a secondhand source. A lot of energy went into figuring out what happened to her, so we know a lot, but in her voice we only have these 5 letters she managed to sneak out of prison before she died.
How does your experience as a journalist inform your work as a historian?
I don’t really think of my work as a reporter and as a historian separately. My trade is sources and stories. When I was reporting, it was always my job to know everything about my subject before an interview, and I spent a lot of time in the morgue, or in databases, researching. As a historian, it’s harder (though not impossible) to interview live sources, but there are still vast swaths of original documents that tell the story. It’s my job – as a reporter or a historian – to interrogate sources and make them cohere as stories.
How would you describe what you write?
I write narrative non-fiction. Traditional history can be bland, written from the point of view of the present, from a results-oriented perspective, as if the conclusion was obvious to everyone at the time. But that’s not how we live at all. No one knew how D-Day would turn out, Eisenhower had no clue. And if you read the histories, it is taken as a given that the Allies won the day. I don’t know who wins the 2020 election. We have no idea how our own lives will end, this is the human condition. So I try to write a story that is true, but I want it to read like lived experience, as if it were a great novel. I am not allowed to make anything up – everything, every thought from a character, every bit of dialogue, every description of every room can be sourced.
Who are some of your favorite authors working today?
Erik Larson is the master of narrative non-fiction. I study everything he writes, I try to reverse-engineer why his books are such a pleasure to read, why they work and how he is just so good.
What do you find most challenging or most exciting about researching historical women?
Women’s work is historically mis-categorized. When I started D-Day Girls, the scholars in the field said women of SOE “didn’t do much” or “they were just couriers” as if parachuting behind enemy lines and blowing up Nazi installments, surviving Gestapo interrogation is somehow not much. And what they mean is it’s not as important as the male agent’s work. (This is, according to men…) If you center the women’s stories – make the men the marginal players – whole new narratives reveal themselves.
So for instance, if we were to pick one thing in WWII that changed the war more than anything else, that did more to turn the war in favor of the Allies, we could reasonably argue that it was ULTRA, the decrypting of the Enigma machine, that allowed us to get our convoys across the Atlantic and overpower Hitler. This was work performed overwhelmingly by a female workforce, Bletchley Park was 80 percent women. So, led by a gay man, Alan Turing, a force of primarily women won World War II.
It takes centering the experiences of marginalized voices to even see an argument that women won the war. This isn’t about participation trophies: we are less safe now, as a nation, if we don’t recognize the way women — and women’s work — contributes to the national defense.
Do you think Women’s History Month is important and why?
It helps to see ourselves in history to make history. We need role models. We shouldn’t have to break every glass ceiling for the first time. Some ceilings were already broken but the stories got lost, mostly because men wrote the stories. There are hidden figures everywhere.
May there be so much equality someday that every month is women’s history month.
And a question from Sarah for Pamela: Tell us about a woman (or group of women) from the past who has inspired your writing.
At the personal level, my grandmother who told me stories about her own childhood that inspired my interest in the past and my mother, who is also a writer and who taught me by example about seizing time to write even when it wasn’t easy.
Moving beyond my own circles: I want to be Barbara Tuchman when I grow up. Like Eric Larson, she was a master of narrative non-fiction. And she pursued stories that caught her imagination across a broad range of periods and topics.
Want to know more about Sarah Rose and her work?
Check out her website: https://sarahrose.com/
Follow her on Twitter: https://twitter.com/thesarahrose
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Come back tomorrow for three questions and an answer with historian Kimberly Sherman, who asked me a really tough question.