The Inspiring Story Of Crystal Lee Sutton

* First Video: Celebrating the Life and Legacy of Crystal Lee Sutton




* Second Video: "Norma Rae" Trailer




Crystal Lee Sutton (née Pulley; December 31, 1940 – September 11, 2009), formerly known as Crystal Lee Jordan, was an American union organizer and advocate who gained fame during the early 1970s. She was fired from her job at the J.P. Stevens plant in Roanoke Rapids, North Carolina for trying to unionize its employees.

According to Wikipedia, Sutton was earning $2.65 an hour folding towels. The poor working conditions she and her fellow employees suffered compelled her to join forces with Eli Zivkovich, a union organizer, and attempt to unionize the J.P. Stevens employees. “Management and others treated me as if I had leprosy,” she stated.

She received threats and was finally fired from her job. But before she left, she took one final stand, filmed verbatim in the 1979 film Norma Rae. “I took a piece of cardboard and wrote the word UNION on it in big letters, got up on my work table, and slowly turned it around. The workers started cutting their machines off and giving me the victory sign. All of a sudden the plant was very quiet…”

Sutton was physically removed from the plant by police, but the result of her actions was staggering. The Amalgamated Clothing and Textile Workers Union won the right to represent the workers at the plant on August 28, 1974. Sutton later became a paid organizer for the ACTWU. Sutton was the 13th recipient of the Pacem in Terris Peace and Freedom Award in 1980. The honor was named after a 1963 encyclical letter, Pacem in Terris (Peace on Earth), by Pope John XXIII, that calls upon all people of good will to secure peace among all nations.

The Real Erin Brockovitch

Erin Brockovich-Ellis (born June 22, 1960) is an American legal clerk and environmental activist who, despite the lack of a formal law school education, or any legal education, was instrumental in constructing a case against the Pacific Gas and Electric Company (PG&E) of California in 1993. Since the release of the film that shares her story and name, she has hosted Challenge America with Erin Brockovich on ABC and Final Justice on Zone Reality. She is the president of Brockovich Research & Consulting, a consulting firm. She is currently working as a consultant for Girardi & Keese on the east coast, the New York law firm Weitz & Luxenberg, which has a focus on personal injury claims for asbestos exposure, and Shine Lawyers in Australia.

The case alleged contamination of drinking water with hexavalent chromium, also known as chromium(VI), in the southern California town of Hinkley. At the center of the case was a facility called the Hinkley Compressor Station, part of a natural gas pipeline connecting to the San Francisco Bay Area and constructed in 1952. Between 1952 and 1966, PG&E used hexavalent chromium to fight corrosion in the cooling tower. The wastewater dissolved the hexavalent chromium from the cooling towers and was discharged to unlined ponds at the site. Some of the wastewater percolated into the groundwater, affecting an area near the plant approximately two miles long and nearly a mile wide. The case was settled in 1996 for US$333 million, the largest settlement ever paid in a direct action lawsuit in US history.

A study released in 2010 by the California Cancer Registry showed that cancer rates in Hinkley "remained unremarkable from 1988 to 2008." An epidemiologist involved in the study said that "the 196 cases of cancer reported during the most recent survey of 1996 through 2008 were less than what he would expect based on demographics and the regional rate of cancer."

Average chromium(VI) levels in Hinkley were recorded as 1.19 ppb with a peak of 3.09 ppb. The PG&E Topock Compressor Station averaged 7.8 ppb and peaks at 31.8 ppb based on the PG&E Background Study. Compare to the California proposed health goal of 0.06 ppb.. (Source: Wikipedia)

Betty Friedan: Men (1964)

Betty Friedan (February 4, 1921 - February 4, 2006) was an American writer, activist, and feminist.

A leading figure in the "Second Wave" of the U.S. Women's Movement, her 1963 book The Feminine Mystique is sometimes credited with sparking the "second wave" of feminism. Friedan co-founded National Organization for Women in 1966 which aimed to bring women "into the mainstream of American society now [in] fully equal partnership with men".

In accordance with wikipedia, in 1970, after stepping down as NOW's first president in 1969, Friedan organized the nation-wide Women's Strike for Equality on August 26, the 50th anniversary of the Nineteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution granting women the right to vote. The national strike was successful beyond expectations in broadening the feminist movement. The New York City march alone attracted over 50,000 women.

Friedan joined other leading feminists (including Gloria Steinem, Shirley Chisholm, Fannie Lou Hamer, Bella Abzug, and Myrlie Evers-Williams) in founding the National Women's Political Caucus in 1971. In 1977 she joined some of the movement's most visible and influential leaders, and 20,000 other women, at the International Women's Year federally-funded convention, the National Women's Conference, a legislative conference which sent a report to President Jimmy Carter, the United States Congress, and all the states on how to achieve equality.

Friedan was a strong proponent of the repeal of abortion laws, founding the National Association for the Repeal of Abortion Laws, which after abortion was legalized in 1973, became the National Abortion Rights Action League. She was also a strong supporter of the Equal Rights Amendment to the Constitution and of abortion rights.

Though somewhat eclipsed by Gloria Steinem as America's preeminent feminist, Friedan continued to be an influential author and intellectual and remained active in politics and advocacy for the rest of her life, authoring six books. One of her later books, The Second Stage, critiqued what Friedan saw as the extremist excesses of some feminists who could be broadly classified as gender feminists.

Salaam Wanita: Empowering Women in Malaysia

A video highlighting the Salaam Wanita project of eHomemakers, which trains disadvantaged women to make baskets.


The video shows the basket weaving process and contains interviews with three weavers.


► Salaam Wanita: Helping disadvantaged Malaysian women help themselves. Order Salaam Wanita's Eco-Baskets @ http://www.justmarketing.info/


► JOIN eHomemakers Malaysia group @ Facebook:
http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=33534789501

Egypt Women Soccer Team

Watch this video about the woman national team of Egypt.


The Egypt women's national football team represents Egypt in international women's football championships. They are the current African Champions having won the 2010 African Nations Cup.


They are also the most successful African team at Confederation level, winning the ACN seven times: the inaugural African Nations Cup in Sudan 1957, and also won the tournament in the United Arab Republic 1959, Egypt 1986, Burkina Faso 1998, Egypt 2006, Ghana 2008 and Angola 2010.

Lillian's Story In Color

Lillian Yonally was one of the few women with a camera during her WASP service from May 1943 to December 1944.



Her color photographs offer a rare glimpse into the short-lived program and the female pilots who were ahead of their time.