 Good morning, friends. We're going to get started in just a moment. Happy to see you so far on this great Sunday morning. Thank you for joining us. And we're going to definitely be using the chat box today so get that ready. And I'm going to throw a couple links in right now. So these are links for today's event library news. And for the YouTube recording that you can watch later. Of this nature boost and all of our nature boosts that we host. So welcome today we are celebrating a LGBTQ plus history month event in partnership with our great friends at the National Park System here in the Bay Area are our soul mates in the natural world. We want to welcome everyone here and acknowledge that we occupy the unceded ancestral homeland of the raw nutrition lonely peoples who are the original inhabitants of the San Francisco peninsula. And acknowledge that we benefit from living and working on their traditional homeland. As uninvited guests we affirm their sovereign rights as first peoples, and wish to pay our respects to the ancestors, elders and relatives of the raw nutrition community. And I'll throw in the chat a reading list and resource list that has some great Bay Area organizations that are working with. They are indigenous or working with indigenous peoples, and lots of information about land rights which are really intriguing. And if you know what territory you're joining us from you can throw that in the chat. Today I'm joining from central Sierra Miwa. I have a couple library announcements I want to share with you all. We are celebrating Filipino American History Month, and we've had some amazing programs. Our final program is with Lydia Ortiz on Thursday, 7pm. She has this amazing artwork you see here. And I encourage you to find her Instagram because she is just a vibrant and amazing artist and I can't wait to hear her story. On Tuesday, actually on Monday and Tuesday we're celebrating our on the same page campaign. This is a campaign that's been going on for many years with our library. It's a bi-monthly read where we encourage all of San Francisco to read the same book. And we are reading the undocumented Americans. Very good very short read you can still run out and get the book today and you know just stay home and read all day and finish it and join us Monday tomorrow night for the book club. The author will not be at the book club, but the author will be Tuesday in our virtual library, Carla Conejo Villalvin-Sincio, along with Jonathan Blitzer in conversation talking about the book, and talking about her work. Let's see and then one other for a couple of the programs I'm going to tell you about coming in November and stay tuned we're still working about whether this will really be a live event in our career, but it will definitely be streaming. Malcolm Margolin and friends for his book deep hanging out, and Malcolm Margolin is a Bay Area icon, and also big in the indigenous movement, and he is the original founder of heyday books. So also he's in, not such great health unfortunately. So I encourage you all to come out to this one and please don't miss an opportunity to to hear about Malcolm and his life and the work that he's done. And then another November program we have is Tony Platt and Milton Reynolds will be in conversation about Platt's book about indigenous graves, and it's called Grave Matters. And they'll be talking about the politics behind this and I know it's happening, but definitely join us. Again, this is a this is a live event, it will be happening live this one for sure. So come up to the sixth floor joining will be spread out. It will be socially distanced, and we will also be streaming it so you can see it both ways. Still trying to figure out that in person programming which is, you know, we'll get there friends will get to see each other again soon, or at least, you know, be near each other soon. I'm a big hugger so it's a problem for me. So today I'm so happy to have Ranger Stephanie back with us again. Thank you Stephanie for being with us, and that it's part of our LGBTQ history month. I'm so happy that we had to do this kind of events, and that we celebrate these kind of events, and that it's with our partners at the NPS. And so, specifically Stephanie is going to be talking about near woods, and the women and that were influential in the upkeep and bringing about of near woods. Okay, with that really great introduction I'm turning it over to your Stephanie. Thank you so much. It's very good. I'm going to put these slides up here, and then I'll be able to get started. Thank you everybody for joining us. And then I also want to make sure that I can see the chat as well. Okay, let's bring it over here. Perfect. So, hello. My name is Stephanie Weinstein and I was National Monument and happy LGBTQ plus history month everybody. I'm so excited for the opportunity to talk to you all today about some of the hidden history and impacts of near woods. This talk is titled connecting the dots near woods history is not a straight line. I'm sure you already see some of the word play here, but my hope for today is to complicate refocus and shift. Not only the historical narrative present about mere woods but how we look at relevant historical narratives in general. If I can get this to move. There we go. When, when people think about mere woods they think of an old growth redwood forest with incredible ecological diversity and history. Today we're going to explore the players behind the scenes of many of mere woods main historical narratives. My PowerPoint is moving a little slowly so bear with me. There we go. When I'm going to be telling you guys a story today. This is a story that goes from the settlement house movement through the redwood forest and to the halls of the United Nations, and my opinion up to today. In this talk I'll mostly be going through this story, but I'll also stop to ask you for your perspective and thoughts throughout as well. If you have any questions up on the screen, please feel free to write your answers in the zoom chat or YouTube live comments, and I'll take a minute, it'll take a minute or so for your answers to load but it all goes well. I'm hoping to be able to read some of them out and learn from you all as well as we go. It seems like the rain might be affecting my internet connectivity a little bit so if it's moving a little slowly I apologize in advance for that too. At the end of it as well I'm going to leave some time for questions too. And if you have any questions that are really burning and relevant just just go ahead and make sure that I that I answer those two. So let's let's get started let's begin with the three dominant stories told about the park. There are three main stories that are often told about mere woods. They're the following. The first one is politician William Kent donated mere woods to the federal government and on January 9, 1908, it became a national monument. The second main story is that in the 1930s, President Franklin D Roosevelt created the Civilian Conservation Corps, which worked on much of the infrastructure found at mere woods today. The third main story is on May 19, 1945, the United Nations held a memorial service at mere woods for Franklin D Roosevelt, a main creator of the United Nations. Who do you feel like is missing from those stories. There are certain people represented there, but who do you feel like is missing. Yes, this out and I'd like for you to add who you think is missing into the chats on YouTube or on on zoom. Okay, I see someone put women. Yep, I agree. Yeah, I see women again true. People of color. Yep, definitely. All the people that supported these great individuals. Yeah. These are great contributions. All of the, all the stories that are told about mere woods are true. Those three stories are definitely true. But they focus on a perspective of history that solely represents the dominant narrative. When we start digging deeper, we find that these three major networks in mere woods history are all connected through women. Many of these women are now viewed by the LGBT plus community as some of their own. There is a historical network that connects all of these events. The histories of mere woods show how change is not created by isolated incidences, but by relationships and movements. To start, I want to give a little bit of context about how this research got started. 2020 was the 100th anniversary of the 19th amendment and the National Park Service was encouraging all sites to share their connection to suffrage. This inspired me to learn more about the suffrage movement and not just its connections to mere woods, but to women's history in general, labor history and LGBT, LGBTQ plus history as well. You can see a picture here of me holding a sign for Jane Adams someone we'll talk about later, and now a personal hero of mine. As I learned more about Adams and others, I began to connect to the figures I was researching and historical thread began to reveal itself. Before we dig into this, all these threads and connections, I want to have a quick conversation about language. I think the NPS LGBTQ LGBTQ plus narrative initiative says it really well so I'm going to read this quote from their Q&A page and you can follow along on the slide. I promise this is the only slide that I'll be rereading to you in the talk, but I think it's a really important one. It says the identity of gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender and queer are very historically and culturally specific. It would be inappropriate to voice an LGBTQ identity on those who did not identify that way. For example, a woman in the early 20th century would not have identified herself as a lesbian first used as a noun in 1925. Just as someone before the late 20th century would not have identified using the word transgender first appearing in 1988. The word homosexual itself was not used until the turn of the 20th century introduced and defined by the psychological profession. Some people regardless of time period also lived their lives quietly, hidden or closeted not identifying publicly as anything other than heterosexual. There may also be inconclusive evidence as to whether individuals were intimate with each other. It's our intent to honor and respect how people identified in their lives. Dressing this in cases where people have not self identified is to talk about the relationships important in their lives. While intimate behavior is often seen as a defining characteristic, many people knew that they were and are gay, lesbian, bisexual or queer before with or without ever having sexual relationships. The reason that I highlighted this particular portion is that none of the figures that we're going to be talking about today publicly identified as LGBTQ plus. Whether it was because of available language, societal pressure or something else. Therefore, I will not be prescribing an identity onto any of these individuals, I'll only be referencing their partners that they shared in their lives. Even though we are not going to define anyone in a way that they did not define themselves. I still think it's incredibly valuable to make their importance to a connection to the LGBTQ plus community visible. It helps to prove that we've always been here and helps people to feel represented in historical narratives. There we go. There are a few other points I want to make clear. One thing we'll talk about and that I want everyone to be cognizant of is the way that time period, race, class and status influence how open someone can be about their sexuality and their gender identity. This is something I hope that you will have in your mind as we go through the story. I also want to make it clear that not every person in these stories was part of the LGBTQ plus community. For instance today we'll talk about some people like William Kent, Ida B. Wells, Mary McLeod Bethune. I'm not claiming that any of these individuals had LGBTQ plus identities. They are important to these stories so I want to include them. I'll do my best to make these distinctions clear but please ask questions if it's not. Alongside of that, none of the LGBTQ plus community members that are main players in this story were romantically involved with each other. So they were friends and I'm making no attempts to claim otherwise. If I say they were friends that's not me trying to skirt anything. I'll be clear about who their partners were or the people they shared their homes or their lives with. I'll do my best to make sure those distinctions are also really clear. Okay so now that we've gone through that housekeeping we can start on the story. So we'll start with the main story number one, the first one we mentioned, the founding of Mirwoods National Monument and its donation. The ancestral land of the Kosmiwok people that is now known as Mirwoods National Monument was once briefly owned by William Kent and Elizabeth Kent. They were strong conservationists and advocates for women's suffrage. But William Kent was a documented racist, particularly against Asian and African Americans. When serving in Congress Kent pushed many discriminatory policies he once said, I have been writing and talking about necessity of keeping this a white man's country for the last 30 years. This actually is one of his more mild quotes. Many of the Kent's friends tried to push them towards more inclusive viewpoint. One of those friends was Jane Adams. Jane Adams was a reformer, a pacifist and a suffragist. She created the whole house in Chicago with her partner Ellen Gates-Darr. The whole house was a settlement house, a safe place for new immigrants to stay and flourish. She was a prominent voice in the progressive era and spoke like the Kent's in support of suffrage. Adams and her new life partner Mary Rosette Smith, who is pictured here with Adams, ran the whole house together for 30 years. The pair were relatively open about their commitment to each other. Adams kept a picture of Smith with her whenever she traveled, and when they traveled together, they always shared a room. In letters, Adams as if they were married. This generally open relationship never interfered with Adams' political or professional life. I'm not saying that Adams or Smith were blatant, but she was never arrested, never put on trial, never accused of being mentally ill. This is a product of her time period and her race and her status. This time period in general was more open to unmarried women sharing their lives with other women, of course without anything explicitly being said. And Adams also held considerable privilege in standing at the time. The whole house was Adams' most proud endeavor, and Jane Adams' influence and reach of an advocate for all people earned her a Nobel Peace Prize in 1931. Jane Adams and William Kent had a long friendship. Kent said of Jane Adams after their first interaction that, I well recall her advent and surprise that came to me when she talked on the whole house work and the benefits that occurred to her and her colleagues from association with the people of the neighborhood. It seems so strange to place this mission on the basis of mutual benefit that it took long to percolate through my mind. My admiration and respect made me think diligently, and I seemingly blundered upon the basis of her theory and practice of democracy. To tell from this quote, Adams and Kent had very different philosophies around social services and mutual benefit. Despite these differences though, Jane Adams influenced Kent to donate land he owned in Chicago to create the city's first public playground in 1894. It was not only a first for Chicago, but may have been the first public playground in the country. In a letter to Kent, she wrote, It seems very absurd to thank you for the use of the playground after all these years, but we really have been grateful and it has been brought untold pleasure to thousands of children and young people. This donation was the first of many for the kents, the kents remain committed to conservation and later donated your woods to the federal government in 1908. Jane Adams had many different friends in her life. Another was investigative journalist, civil rights activist and educator IW Wells. IW Wells was a good friend of Jane Adams. IW Wells and the National Association of Colored Women had a formal gathering at the whole house in the summer of 1899, where they met the first, they met for the first time. Wells activism and anti lynching campaigns greatly inspired Adams. At a meeting that Wells organized after a mob lynching of an innocent man in Kentucky, Adam said that lynch mobs further run a certain risk of brutalizing each spectator of shaking his belief in law and order, and of showing seeds of future violence. This was her first time speaking out against racial injustice. When Adams later wrote respect for the law, this condemned mob violence because it undermined due process. But she implied that it was possible that African Americans might be guilty of the crimes that white mob crimes that white mob accused them of. Wells was understandably disappointed by this stance. She replied in the independent that Adams was correct in her stance on lynching but was incorrect in what Wells called unfortunate presumptions of lynching victims. When Wells was born into slavery and raised in Mississippi, she understood the depths of racism in a way that Kent and Adams did not and would not. Despite their differences, Wells and Adams remained allies, both advanced and advocated against school segregation in Chicago, and became founding members of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, the NAACP in 1909. For the rest of her life, Adams remained consistent in her calls for racial equity. Jane Adams had many different friends in her life. I'm curious from you all, have you ever had a relationship with someone you didn't always agree with? How does this affect your relationship with that person? And how did it affect your relationship with others? I'd love to see if you have any examples, if you could put them in the chat. I know this is a big question. So I see working relationships, some that you've navigated where you have different opinions, you navigated them carefully. That makes sense. If you're not comfortable putting an answer in the chat as well, you can also just kind of think about it, something that I'm sure Adams struggled with in her life as well as something that we can relate to now. So in addition to William Kent and Ida B. Wells, Jane Adams formed another friendship with someone that became really important to her. And this was political leader Francis Perkins. Francis Perkins grew up in a wealthy family and moved to Chicago to become a teacher. Instead, she became very involved with Jane Adams and the whole house. This gave Perkins her first glimpse into the influence that women could have on human rights. Settlement houses like the whole house would be the beginning of the field of social work. Perkins work at the whole house inspired her to work with people facing poverty and unemployment. Francis Perkins said, I had to do something about unnecessary hazards to life unnecessary poverty. It was sort of up to me this feeling sprung out of a period of great philosophical confusion which overtakes all young people. Francis Perkins moved to New York City in 1909. She saw the horrible working conditions factory workers face in the garment district. This is when Francis Perkins joined the labor movement. This is where she met another prominent labor activist, Rose Schneiderman. Rose Schneiderman was a Jewish immigrant from Poland. She worked in the garment factories and bought for her rights, safe working conditions and fair pay. Schneiderman and Perkins work together in the labor movement and their varied life experiences help to diversify their work. Their activism caught the eye of another progressive woman and NAACP member who had an influence in politics, Elmer Roosevelt. You can see Schneiderman in the middle and Elmer Roosevelt next to her in this picture. The three women became lifelong friends and these professional relationships lead us to the Mirwood main story number two, which is about the Civilian Conservation Corps. Governor Franklin D. Roosevelt appointed both Perkins and Schneiderman to governmental positions in New York State. When Franklin D. Roosevelt became president, he made Francis Perkins the secretary of the Department of Labor. This made her the first woman to ever hold a cabinet position. Pretty cool. Francis Perkins often lived with other women in her Washington, D.C. home. This included Mary Rumsey, who was the founder of the Junior League, and also with representative Carolyn O'Day, who's pictured here next to Perkins. Francis Perkins and Carolyn O'Day made their house a center of politics in Washington, D.C. and it's actually now a national historic landmark. Franklin D. Roosevelt appointed Rose Schneiderman to the Labor Advisory Board and National Recovery Administration. She was the only woman appointed. Schneiderman had a longstanding relationship with fellow labor activist Maude O'Farrell Schwartz, who's pictured next to her here. Schwartz was part of the Women's Trade Union and Schneiderman and Schwartz would often do political work with the Roosevelt. Schwartz actually worked with Francis Perkins when she was appointed Labor Secretary of the New York State Department of Labor by Roosevelt. And Rose Schneiderman worked closely with both the First Lady and the President. She gave an important perspective on labor rights, equal wages for women, and the right to form a union. Rose Schneiderman was instrumental in creating the New Deal and many important programs such as the National Labor Relocation Act, the Social Security Act, and the Fair Labor Standards Act. Francis Perkins was a leader in creating the Civilian Conservation Corps. She said, it was extremely well conducted. It made out of what could have been a dreadful flop and a dreadful hazard, a project that was intelligent, well behaved, and therefore is well thought of in the community. We did it by getting the Army to run it, the Forest Service to direct its work. We kept them in order and the Forest Service selected good projects. Although it was an expensive form of relief, it accomplished a good deal and was invaluable in the training of young men. The projects from the New Deal and the Civilian Conservation Corps, or the CCC, put many people back to work. This created infrastructure in many national parks, including Mirwood's National Women's Society of the CCC doing work in Redwood Creek. In 1933, over 200 CCCs arrived at Tomopai State Park and bungled the working camp. The CCC worked on many different types of projects such as fire protection and flood control, trail improvements, new bridges, and visitor amenities such as signs, benches, comfort stations, picnic facilities, as well as the now famous entrance arch. By far the largest natural resource management project that the CCC undertook at Mirwood was providing erosion control for Redwood Creek. Redwood Creek meanders through Mirwood, then like most streams is prone to flooding during heavy winter rains, causing the water and the dirt to run off into damage and erode the surrounding trees and the trails. The CCC at Mirwood installed these rock walls on the side of the creek in an attempt to channel it, straighten it, and reduce any kind of erosion. You can see examples of these rock walls in this image behind the men. And we'll talk more about this infrastructure later on in the story. Francis Perkins said of the CCC, we expect these men in the reforestation camps to become leaders of their generation when they return to their homes. We expect that they will prepare themselves for such leadership. On March 23, 1933 Francis Perkins made her first appearance before a congressional committee to argue that the CCC should be passed as a relief program instead of a jobs program. She said that a congressman, and I quote, had also said after I testified on the CCC bill that I'd made a good appearance, but he'd hate to be married to me. The bill was passed and approved by the president less than two weeks later. There was another very important person at that congressional committee meeting. Perkins good friend First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt accompanied her. Eleanor Roosevelt was incredibly supportive of the Civilian Conservation Corps, but there was one thing she did not like about the program. It was only open to men. Eleanor Roosevelt came up with the idea for the Farah camps or the Federal Emergency Relief Association. These would later be called she she she camps. You get it. It was a federal relief program that employed women and land management and conservation jobs. There was great resistance to the program, but Francis Perkins and Eleanor Roosevelt worked together to set up the program in 1938. Activist and lawyer Paulie Murray worked at Camp Tara and set up the experience. The camp was ideal ideal for building up run down bodies and renewing jaded spirits. Perkins said that the CCC would help to create better leaders. I'm curious from you all have you ever had an experience similar to CCC or she she she camps that kind of shape your life, especially as a young person in a formative years. See if you want to put anything in the chat summer camp. Yeah. Oh cool the national outdoor leadership school. Oh that sounds amazing. I'm going to look that up. This is outdoors as a young person can definitely shape things. You to the minute to load student conservation association in terms and ideal ideal modeled after the CCC how cool yeah, the CCC was a really influential and exciting moment in US history to shape these kind of programs for young people. Okay awesome thank you for sharing those experiences with us. So Eleanor Roosevelt who we talked about a little before, and who most people know of was a firm and social leader. As a young adult she worked in social work and a settlement house movement. Her husband's political career started and and started to advance going from governor to president. I'm going to comment could you give more history into CCC history and current state, if possible. Yes, I'll I can answer that question at the end. We'll talk about them a little more too at the end. Okay so Eleanor Roosevelt was raising six kids while her husband was going from governor to president, and even during this time, she was still active in the political movements in New York. So Eleanor Roosevelt's political partnership was the foundation of their marriage. I want to say that again, the Roosevelt's political partnership was the foundation of their marriage surviving correspondence suggests that Eleanor Roosevelt had a long standing relationship with journalist Lorraine Hitchcock. The pair remain devoted to each other for the length of Hitchcock's life. So Eleanor Roosevelt's presidency, World War two started Eleanor Roosevelt was very active as first lady during this time. A national member of the NAACP, she actively opposed lynchings and supported racial justice amongst the armed forces. She famously flew in a plane with the Tuskegee Airmen to counter the view that black soldiers could not fly. She also advocated for peace. The work of Franklin D Roosevelt and Eleanor Roosevelt leads us to main story of Mirwood number three, which is the United Nations when they hosted FDR is met a moral service at Mirwoods. The end of World War two was approaching and Franklin D Roosevelt created the name the United Nations and worked on creating the organization to further international diplomacy. The administration planned a conference of delegates in San Francisco to initiate the organization. Two weeks before the conference, Frank Franklin D Roosevelt passed away from a stroke. Despite this huge loss, the event continued as planned, as he wished. On May 19 1945 over 500 delegates from over 46 nations came to Mirwoods to honor the fallen president. The Secretary of State at the time said, these great redwoods at Mirwoods National Monument are the most enduring of all trees. Many of them stood here centuries after every man now living is dead. They are as timeless and as strong as the ideals and faith of Franklin D Roosevelt. An important person in Eleanor Roosevelt's life was also at the 1945 conference to draft the United Nations Charter in San Francisco. Mary McLeod Bethune attended as a consultant and advisor on behalf of NAACP. She made recommendations on the importance of ending colonization of prioritizing education and creating an international bill of rights. She was the only black woman in attendance. She was an educator and activist and a lifelong friend of the Roosevelt's. She served as president for many important organizations for black women and grew these organizations in mission and scope. She was an advisor to United States presidents, especially Roosevelt. She was instrumental in increasing the rights of African Americans during the Great Depression and World War II, especially women in the armed forces. Bethune was the first African American to head a federal agency when President Roosevelt created a specific department for African Americans within the National Youth Administration. She was incredibly important in shaping Eleanor Roosevelt's understanding of racial inequity in the United States. Eleanor Roosevelt said, I for one am proud that our country could produce a myth bassoon. Very sweet. I love this picture of them. Less than a year after the UN conference in San Francisco and the Memorial of Muir Woods, Eleanor Roosevelt became a United States delegate to the first United Nations UN General Assembly. Eleanor Roosevelt went into her work as a delegate with progressive viewpoints and determination. Progressive as she was, Roosevelt sought out the insight of other progressive people too. Another important figure in Eleanor Roosevelt's life who pushed her towards understanding the importance of racial equality was Dr. Polly Muir. I want to be transparent for a second in that I don't really know how to talk about Muir's gender identity. Muir was a fervent activist for gender equality. Muir was also gender nonconforming and may have even unsuccessfully sought out hormone therapy in the late 1930s and early 40s. Since the language for gender nonconforming individuals was so different at the time than it is now, I've made the decision to refrain from using any pronouns to describe Muir. There's no direction that I've decided to go, but other publications have gone in different directions, including the National Park Service pages about Muir. I also want to acknowledge that Eleanor Roosevelt refers to Muir as a woman in the quote that I'm about to use now. Roosevelt said of Muir, one of my finest young friends is a charming woman lawyer, Polly Muir, who's been quite a firebrand at times, but of whom I'm very fond. Polly Muir first met Eleanor Roosevelt while Muir was working at the New Deals Federal Relief Association at Camp Tara. You guys remember that quote of hers earlier? Muir refused to stand to honor Eleanor Roosevelt when she visited because of President Roosevelt's discriminatory policies toward African Americans. Muir went on to write a letter to the president and First Lady in 1938 about the challenges African Americans faced as assistance programs faded and segregation continued. To Muir's surprise, Eleanor Roosevelt wrote back. This was the beginning of their impactful friendship. The pair wrote letters for over 25 years. Polly Muir was a civil rights activist and lawyer. After graduating from Howard University Law School, Muir was rejected from Harvard Law based on gender. Muir instead received a master's in law from Berkeley Law and was the first African American to become a doctor of the science of law from Yale Law School, which is the school's most advanced law degree. In 1951 Muir wrote state laws on race and color and extensive collection of state laws and ordinances that sanctioned racial segregation in the 1950s. Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall would call this work the Bible for lawyers working on civil rights cases. In 1961 Muir worked on the President's Commission on the Statue of Women's Civil and Political Rights Committee. This is where Muir developed a new technique for contesting discrimination based on gender using the 14th Amendment. This work led to Muir's input to have sex included in the Civil Rights Act of 1964. This also resulted in Muir becoming an honorary co-author on Supreme Court Justice Ruth Berdickensburg, 1971 Equal Protection Case Read vs. Read. Just as a quick aside, in my opinion, Polly Muir is one of the most overlooked gender rights activists and civil rights activists of our time. Polly Muir pushed Eleanor Roosevelt to become more progressive and was honest with her about the discrimination the African Americans were facing. Polly Muir was arrested and hospitalized many times for homosexuality and gender nonconformity. Muir was living in a time that increased discrimination against LGBTQ plus individuals, even more so on people of color. Muir was one of many LGBTQ rights activists who were civil rights activists who were sidelined because of their sexuality. Another notable example is Fired Rustin. Muir would visit with Roosevelt often and brought female partners to meet Roosevelt during these visits. Polly Muir eventually had a longstanding relationship with Irene Barlow, you can see pictured here. Barlow was also a lawyer and the pair are actually now buried together in a Brooklyn cemetery. Muir was never open about this relationship, even while writing an autobiography. Polly Muir said of her relationship with Roosevelt, I just used the wrong gender, the wrong pronoun, Polly Muir said of Roosevelt's friendship. For me becoming friends with Miss Roosevelt was a slow, painful process marked by sharp exchanges and correspondence, often angered on anger on my side and exasperation on her side and a gradual development of mutual admiration and respect. Muir also said the measure of her greatness was her capacity for growth, her ruthless honesty with herself and the generosity with which she responded to criticism. Polly Muir's influence on Eleanor Roosevelt gave the First Lady a more open-minded perspective. Both Muir and Bethane's activism helped to shape Roosevelt's understanding of domestic and international politics. In 1946, Eleanor Roosevelt joined the United Nations Human Rights Commission. She helped to draft the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. When it was announced, she said, where after all do universal human rights begin? In small places close to home. So close and so small, they cannot be seen on any maps of the world. Yet they are the world of the individual person, the neighborhood he lives in, the school or college he attends, the factory, farm or office where he works. Such are the places where every man, woman and child seeks equal justice, equal opportunity, equal dignity without discrimination. Unless these rights have meaning there, they have little meaning anywhere. Without concerned citizens to uphold those close to home, we shall look in vain for progress in the larger world. We can see how the legacy of these people and LGBTQ plus leaders connects to Muir Woods and how Muir is the history of this nation. So now I have a few other ways to describe and add context to the main stories told about Muir Woods. As a review, Jane Adams' work in Chicago and beyond influenced William Kent's views on conservation and community. Frances Perkins and Rose Schneiderman helped create the New Deal and formed the Civilian Conservation Corps. And after has been passed away, Eleanor Roosevelt, influenced by Paulie Murray and by others, helped write a fundamental text of the United Nations called the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. What do you think we gain from telling these stories and changing the dominant narrative? What do we gain when we now shift how we tell these stories about Muir Woods? I'd love to see some of your thoughts in the chat. A more holistic look. Yeah. Oh, good. Is that a better myself? Yeah. I'll take a look at there. Oh, I see another answer. Great. A true story, even the negative and shameful sides. Yeah. I'm going to talk about that a little bit more too. Bill, that was a perfect segue into what I want to talk about next. I'll look and see if there are any other comments also on this front. I'll get into the talk too. So to me, these stories show the importance of remaining open to change. Another example of that is at Muir Woods is in the Redwood Creek Renewal Project. Much of the work done by the CCC like the rock walls that you saw earlier being put into the creek are having to be undone now to restore the habitat. Since the 1930s, we've learned a lot about how streams and forests work. We know now, we now know that by turning the stream into a straight channel, the rock walls on the side of the creek actually makes the water flow faster, which increases erosion. And turning the creek into a straight channel did not allow for flexibility and fluidity. We now know that streams need space to move to meander and change over time. We know that fish need bends, pools, rocky areas, tree roots and logs where they can shelter and find food and spawn. When you visit Muir Woods today, you can still see parts of the CCC's work and these rock walls in the creek. Some sections of the rock walls are still visible. But where salmon need it most, the park is removing the rock walls and letting the creek return to its natural flow. When you visit Muir Woods, you'll see small construction projects happening throughout the park and that's to help to restore this habitat and bring it back to its natural flow. I think that this story relates to how we talk about history and park stories. Myself and my colleagues are trying to reshape how we tell our park stories. And this can be done in a lot of different ways. And this can look like adding important context to our interpretive programs. Like editing the signs at our sites such as the picture that you see here, which is of the project history under construction. In this program here, we're added pieces to what we're missing from a timeline like Indigenous and women contributions as well as more context about the lives and in many cases harms that were contributed by the founders of the monument. So that's what this picture is of here, that interpretive program. But it can also be done through reshaping park narratives and trying out different forms of storytelling and engaging beyond our park boundaries. Diversifying park narratives only serves to help more people connect to these sites and give a broader and more complete and contextual understanding of history. Connecting these dots in history and complicating these stories and timelines shows that Muir Woods history is in fact not a channeled creek. It is not a straight line. Muir Woods history, as all history is, is ever evolving, shifting and meandering. And we're even in it right now. We're in that issue right now, which I think is pretty exciting. I went through a lot of history pretty quickly. So I'm going to now open it up to questions. I think that I didn't miss anything in the chat, but I'll stop scaring my screen that you can just, I guess have a big picture of my face. Okay, there we go. So it looks like one of the things that I missed reading was, Risa said, I hope I'm saying your name right. I think one of the saddest aspects of whitewash history is how much more interesting the real history actually is when we stop pretending it's men thought of everything. Yeah. When you add women's perspective people of color perspectives. That is, that just makes the story richer and as to it I agree. So I'm going to pull up and see if there's anything in the, I don't see any Q&A stuff I think maybe they were just all dropped in the chat. Let's see. So I want to go back to the question about the CCC. And I can't, I can't say that I'm an expert on this building conservation core but it was an incredible program created during the New Deal era. And it actually made infrastructure at many national parks across the country, including the Grand Canyon, many parks on the East Coast. So Francis Perkins, you know, influence can be seen in all of those national parks around the country. And its legacy continues mostly within youth organizations today. There is a youth conservation conservation core that still exists. And it's not just for men. It's fully integrated now. And those types of programs have stemmed like we saw examples given in the YouTube live chats and other chats of programs that people did when they were younger that were inspired by this building conservation core so it exists today and just in different ways and not as a job relief program but more as a way for youth to engage with the National Park Service and other, you know, man management organizations around the country. So that is my very brief overview. But there's so much more to learn about it and I know that I have even more to learn about it's really rich history. Let's see. Here's another question. How can I get involved? Oh, that's a great question. Well, if you have, we always love volunteers who do research about the site. So if you have any information that you think will be valuable for the Park Service to know about these sites, please, please let us know. As well as just showing support for this types of programming so whether that's leaving comment cards or or emails of support to, to, to the communications teams you know just things showing that this is the type of interpretation that you want to see is always good to give backing to the type of work we're trying to do. But yeah doing your own research let us know what you learn. We want it to be a really collaborative process because we're always wanting to hear these new stories. I see. Oh, comments about. Oh, as far as how to reach us if you go to Mirwood website or email we have one of those little contact forms in there. And that's a really good way to get to get to the park as well as through Golden Gate National Recreation Area which is what we're a part of. Those, those, those websites also have great channels but I can try to get the, yeah there we go the websites in the chat now thank you. I see a question here. How do other stories. Oh, around around sexual identity pronouns it's a really good question. It's one that I am that I struggled with in writing the article that I wrote about this subject around polymury. I also just recently wrote an article about Jackie Garland who was who served in the Philippines and during the earth, during the 1906 earthquake in a presidio, and he was a female at birth, but presented as a man for most of his life of living in the 1800s when the language around transgender individuals was of course really different. What I found with, for me personally with making these types of decisions is just kind of seeing what others have done who are talking about the subject and then also just kind of deciding what makes sense to me and to the people around me that I'm collaborating with. I didn't feel comfortable identifying polymury with a particular pronoun, but I will say that most historical narratives around polymury do use. Her pronouns when writing about polymury so I think that is an evolving conversation around this particular historical figure, but it is really particular for each historical identifier and all the context around their life and I think it's something to really defer to the LGBTQ plus community members and historians on, but it's an ever evolving thing and I'd like to say that there's an exact science but there isn't I know that it's something that a lot of people are still talking about I was actually just watching. There's a documentary now about polymury that just got released where it really it really touches on the challenge with this and a lot of LGBTQ activists in that in that documentary use they then programs to describe polymury which is a good safe choice to kind of make sure you're not identifying like giving an identified pronoun to someone who wasn't able to do that for themselves so that's that's a solution I've seen presented as well. The good question. See are there any questions in the YouTube live. Okay, I don't see any more questions if you have any more. Now is the. Now is the time. Any book rex. Oh, that's a good question. I've most of the research that I did on this particular subject. I was a professional Googler and he's a lot of online resources which if you go to our website to our stories page. It's all of those resources that I use are linked on the bottom of that page for the article that shares a lot of the same information. And one book that's really interesting called that that. The exact title is escaping my mind but it's about it about firebrand which details all the letters between polymury and Eleanor Roosevelt and they're really impactful friendship. And that is a very good read. And there's other books about polymury's life as well that go into that more. Oh, look at that perfect. That's in the chat now. The fireman and the first lady. So that was a really good one. As far as exploring LGBTQ history in San Francisco, there are so many good books like wide open town by name void, as well as Jose Saria's biography. Those ones there are so many resources and San Francisco Public Library actually has all those books I know because I took them out from their library. And so there's a plethora of resources also around just LGBTQ history in San Francisco in general. But Francis Perkins had a whole oral history project that's mostly online where I grabbed a bunch of her quotes from. And that one's a really good read as well as not a book form but it's like it's a whole online directory of her oral history. So really good resources on linked on the website that this article is on on the NPS page. Thanks. What a nice comment. Yeah, I think and even even I messed up in my talk and use the incorrect pronoun and just saw it acknowledged it and then and then we use different words and changed it. I think, yeah, I agree. I think it's important to just be open to that change if we're going to teach history about change, let me see open to it ourselves. Right. You say yeah, yeah. Yeah, it's definitely a challenge to not take it personally on yourself but that doesn't help the situation just be be understanding and and and move forward and do the right thing next time. Shall I come back on. Yeah I think we're I think we're a wonderful point to me so I mean, you know, acknowledge that you screwed up and come back to it and just being able to, you know, you are doing it. So that's, that's the work and we all mess up. Welcome back. And I like that idea of giving yourself a grace. Stephanie and library community. This was such a beautiful library community today. Thank you for joining us on this rainy day and YouTube viewers as well. Thank you all and Lisa are behind the scenes. Thank you as well. All right, friends will do it again. Stephanie, big thank you to you. Thank you. And any last comments. Good. Yeah, I feel good. And, you know, you can always reach out to the park if you have any other questions were just we want to hear from you and we're excited to be able to continue this type of research. Definitely and we are YouTube channel now has just a whole list of nature boost programs that we've done like this and we've done quite a few with our park friends and they are all deep there there's no like, you know, it's a very deep stuff and it's really intriguing. We've had a few LGBT themed ones as well as like identity. And it's just, they're just powerful. So we thank you so much for being able to, you know, you're sharing a lot of history but you're also sharing yourself so we appreciate all of that. All right, friends. Happy Sunday. Have a good Wednesday dry everybody.