It seems more than appropriate to talk about the woman that all of college sports is talking about right now. Pat Summitt. The Naismith Coach of the Century. The coach who has won more games than any other college coach. The only woman on Sporting News' 50 Greatest Coaches of all time. Pat Summitt has won more NCAA basketball games than any other coach in any division, including both men and women, and is one of only three college coaches overall (in any sport) to win more than 1,000 games. She has never had a losing season. Pat Summit wins. It's what she does. And the whole basketball world wants to know if she will make it back to the University of Tennessee to coach another year. Last year, Pat Summitt released the sad news that she is struggling with early onset Alzheimer's. Few people know how this has affected her coaching overall, yet ESPN has taken the liberty to speculate wildly during the recent televised playoffs. Then again, ESPN has never been known for its compassion. Pat Summitt is a legend. She has the legendary stories to go right along with the moniker. Stories of washing the team's uniforms herself and driving the van to away games. That was back in the day, of course. Back in the day when women's basketball was in its infancy. Back in the day when women's basketball wasn't even a NCAA sanctioned sport. Of course, Pat was just padding her numbers back then :) You don't become the coach who has won more than anybody else without a little sweat and grit and hard work. You don't create a formidable dynasty of basketball in a year or two. Pat Summitt is women's basketball. She had a hand in making the game what it is today. She was the one pushing for a full-on sport that used the whole court, not just half, that played with five players instead of six. She helped the University of Tennessee manage the funding of women's sports by working together with the then more-profitable men's teams. She was asked twice by Tennessee to coach their men's team, but she has stayed with the Lady Vols throughout her career. Pat Summitt cares about her team. 45 of her players have gone on to become head coaches. Every single one of her players has received a degree. Pat Summitt was the first female coach to be on the cover of Sports Illustrated Magazine, and one of very few women who grace its cover sans a swimsuit. There is so much more to Pat Summitt than I could ever cover one short blog post. Her webpage is here: http://www.utladyvols.com/sports/w-baskbl/mtt/summitt_pat00.html A link to her foundation is here : http://patsummitt.org/ You can follow her on twitter if you wish. @patsummitt Lend your own spirit to the multitudes who pray for her return to the court next year. This is your new blog post. Click here and start typing, or drag in elements from the top bar.
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There are a few young 'uns on my list who may possibly be thinking about having children. That is what made Ina May Gaskin jump to the forefront of my 365 project. Ina May's book, Spiritual Midwifery, changed everything-for me, for the world, every-thing. I only wish I had read it before my kids were born, not after. There's a book out there that every "expecting" mom gets whether she likes it or not. The title is something like What to Expect when you're Expecting. That book? Complete Rubbish. Make a nice art piece out of that book and then go and get Ina May's books and read them. Have your spouse read them, too. Ina May is truth. All others pale in comparison. Ina May Gaskin was born in Iowa, the daughter of a farmer and a schoolteacher. Her maternal grandparents ran a Presbyterian orphanage. In the 1970's she began a commune in Tennessee known as The Farm and with other midwives founded The Farm Midwifery Center which was one of the first out-of-hospital birth centers in the United States. After reading Ina May's books on birthing, I realized that some of the reasons our world is so messed up has to do with the actual beginning of our time on this planet: with how we are birthed. Birthing metaphors are there in all disciplines of study if we look for them. Actual birthing is possibly the most powerful human act. Therefore, Ina May's work and activism is groundbreaking. It is indeed a counter-cultural and revolutionary feminist act to take one of our most sacred abilities as women out of the hands of the male dominated medical establishment. In 1977, Ina May published Spiritual Midwifery. In 1987, she published Babies, Breastfeeding, and Bonding. In 2002, Spiritual Midwifery was re-published. In 2003, Ina May's Guide to Childbirth, and in 2005, Ina May's Guide to Breastfeeding. By taking back the power of women's natural abilities to carry and labor children, Ina May is known for her abilities to draw on the power of women's bodies without the need for medical intervention. Her own techniques in assisting childbirth, especially The Gaskin Maneuver, also called all fours, a technique to reduce shoulder dystocia is not only used at The Farm, but is now used by the medical profession at large. Ina May has lectured extensively on midwifery, and continues to do so today. She has won numerous awards for her work, including an Honorary Doctorate from Thames Valley University in London, and was co-winner of the 2011 Right Livelihood Award. If you have never heard of Ina May Gaskin, you should definitely check her out. Her books are easy to read and understand, and are highly recommended by me. I honestly think any human being--both male and female-- should read her books before or while beginning a family. I am sure those books will change your life, just like they changed mine. When I was a wee baby dyke of only 19, I was in college at Central Michigan University and floundering to find a major area of study that I could excel in. I kept finding myself more and more in the company of women who were part of the women's studies program there. With the help of a couple of guiding professors who later became advisors, I became a history major with a women's studies minor (the only available degree option in women's studies at the time). While I like to say I spent my college years studying women, I did actually do enough work to graduate. I wish I had pictures now of Dr. Carol Green-Devens Ramirez, and Dr. Claudia Clark. But alas, that was before these interwebs had the possibility of recording our every move. Sarah Emma Edmonds (1841-1898) was the first woman I ever wrote a paper on. Professor Carol Green-Devens was then editor of the Michigan Historical Review at Clarke Historical Library where some of Sarah Emma Edmonds' papers were kept. During the Civil War, Sarah enlisted in the 2nd Michigan Infantry as Franklin Thompson. She at first served as a male field nurse, participating in several campaigns under General McClellan, including the First andSecond Battle of Bull Run, Antietam, the Peninsula Campaign, Vicksburg, and others. I was particularly intrigued by the story I read which said she was prompted to join the army by a book she had read in her youth about a girl named Fanny Campbell and her adventures on a pirate ship dressed as a man. In 1864 Boston publisher DeWolfe, Fiske, & Co. published Edmonds' account of her military experiences as The Female Spy of the Union Army. One year later her story was picked up by a Hartford, CT publisher who issued it with a new title, Nurse and Spy in the Union Army. It was a huge success, selling in excess of 175,000 copies. In 1867, she married L. H. Seelye, a Canadian mechanic with whom she had three children. Her two sons and her daughter died young, so she adopted two boys. In 1886, she received a government pension of $12 a month for her military service, and after some campaigning, gained an honorable discharge. In 1897, she became the only woman admitted to the Grand Army of the Republic, the Civil War Union Army veterans' organization. Edmonds died in La Porte, Texas and is buried in Washington Cemetery in Houston, Texas. She was a civil war hero and should be remembered as such. She was inducted into the Michigan Women's Hall of Fame in 1992. Edmonds book was reprinted again in 1999 with a new title, Memoirs of a Soldier, Nurse and Spy. While I did extensive study on her in the early 1990's and drew from original documents, I have outrageously plagiarized Wikipedia for this bio.For more information on Sarah Emma Edmonds, see Michigan Women's Historical Center and Hall of Fame page, Memoirs of A Soldier, Nurse and Spy, or go go Wikipedia or Google to find out more. |
DawnWomen's history geek, mom, lesbian, theologian, dreamer. Archives
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