March is Women's History Month

You may not know this but March is Women's History Month. In honor of this celebration that can be traced back to the early 1900s, I've picked First Lady Michelle Obama as the person in history I'd like to acknowledge and honor.

Beginning in Europe 1911, Women's History Month was first celebrated on March 8 as International Women's Day. The celebration was meant to draw attention to woman issues such as winning the right to vote, hot buttons both in many Europe as well as in the United States.

The great depression of the 30s saw women's issues go out of the window and the came World War II. By the time the late 60s/early 70s women issues were back in fashion and our concerns once again took a national platform with the birth of The National Organization for Women whose goal has been "to take action" to bring about equality for all women. In 1987, at the request of the National Women's History Project, Congress expanded the week to a month, and the U.S. Congress has issued a resolution every year since then.

Today, the purpose of Women's History Month is to increase consciousness and knowledge of women's history: to take one month of the year to remember the contributions of notable and ordinary women, in hopes that the day will soon come when it's impossible to teach or learn history without remembering these contributions.

This year for Women's History Month I'd like to recognize the contributions of our First Lady, Michelle Obama. From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia her bio reads:

"Michelle LaVaughn Robinson Obama (born January 17, 1964) is the wife of the forty-fourth President of the United States, Barack Obama, and the first African-American First Lady of the United States. She was born and grew up on the South Side of Chicago and graduated from Princeton University and Harvard Law School. After completing her formal education, she returned to Chicago and accepted a position with the law firm Sidley Austin, and subsequently worked as part of the staff of Chicago mayor Richard M. Daley, and for the University of Chicago Medical Center. Throughout 2007 and 2008, she helped campaign for her husband's presidential bid."

She is a stunning, well educated, classy woman and this month she is my woman of honor for Women's History Month. Representing not only the struggle of women but also, as the first Black First Lady of the US, she is a positive by-product of the struggle for civil rights. We've only begun to see what she is made of and I look forward to following her career in the White House.