 So my name is Deltra, Deltra Ferguson, and I have the privilege of being the coordinator for the WRC, the Women's Resource Center, on the SOU campus, from September 2004. It's when they had the audacity to bring me on. I went to the University of Oregon as an undergraduate and discovered theater. That's another of my great loves is the theater. It was kind of a wild time and I, my girlfriend and I at that time loaded our truck and our cats up and moved to San Francisco after that, where I guess I just had to kind of figure out who I was. Well exciting things happened there. I met some good friends, I learned a lot about life, and I went to a women's festival in California and really discovered what that scene was about and that was really pretty cool. And then I went to the Michigan Women's Music Festival hearing about that and actually went back to that festival and helped to build it every year. I was part of the workers community, it's called the workers community, the women who put it up and created this city of women and creativity. I did that for about 10 years each summer. A real blessing in my life, very informative for me. And when I was first there I got to experience some of my, really some of the earliest San Francisco, it was called the San Francisco Gay and Lesbian Freedom Day Parade. That was its early, in its early, you know, incarnation. Harvey Milk in 1976, first parade, right? Amazing man. These parades through San Francisco would attract thousands, hundreds of thousands of people, right? Well I was there in the early 80s and AIDS was emerging in the community and what was most striking to me was the way in which the parade transformed from a joyous, very colorful, very queer, very whoo-hoo kind of event full of pride, full of pride to a funeral march. It went black. That was amazing. We, I want to say, and I'm going to get my years wrong, but I think it was 1985 and may have been 84 and we went to the parade and it was like a funeral funeral dirge. It was quiet and weird and that's what that felt like and there was rage that exploded out of the gay male community after that, of course, and we saw some of it. In the early 90s, the big marches on Washington, on the Capitol happened. They rolled out the names project onto the lawn in between the Capitol and the Lincoln Memorial and it stretched the whole way. It was just this amazing thing and we walked through it. You could walk through it and around it and look at the different panels that were there and really try to get a handle on the magnitude of that. Was there a social, political, or cultural alliance between gays and lesbian at the time because that had sort of splintered? Yeah. There was a coming together that was very interesting to see. I went to Northwestern and I had colleagues in Chicago. One of my colleagues was a gay man and we were talking about our culture and things and talking about how different lesbians in gay men were and how there had been a lot of history of just going because we were so different and yet we were brought together by our shared persecution without a doubt. I laughed and I said, you know, during AIDS we lesbians, we really rose up and supported the gay male community and did a lot of organizing and did a lot of support. He smiled kind of sheepishly and he said, yes, you really did. I said, you know, if the shoe had been on the other foot, what do you think would have happened? He smiled and kind of bowed his head and I said, there wouldn't have been anything whether we wouldn't have had anything. He said, yep, that's right. That's a fact. So that's it, you know, but I don't really care about that. I care that we pulled it together. That's what I care about. I think I was a feminist from the time I knew I was a girl. So it's sort of just in my body and very naturally there. And so finding my way through time to what was called the women's community and to feminism and to lesbian feminism was just a very natural unfolding of my life. I went to Northwestern after San Francisco and completed a degree from there, a performance studies degree. Very important because it really broadened my notion of what the theater was and I could perform things that were important to me. It helped me find my voice. I created a performance around a woman named Malvina Reynolds for example. Malvina, some of the old-timers will remember Malvina. She was a politically active older woman in Berkeley in the 70s. She wrote little boxes. She would write a song before breakfast every morning. She was really quite the character and a wonderful spirit and I took her work and put it together into this performance. So part of my expression of myself as a feminist came, got to come together with the theater and then there it was. It was really, really neat stuff. And another place where that happened is when I came back from Chicago and eventually wound my way around until I made it into graduate school for that PhD at the University of Oregon. And there I was very feeling very empowered to do a lot of really interesting kinds of performance and so forth that was going on. And I began to teach women's studies. I started out as a GTF teaching women's studies 101. Great big women's studies classrooms. We would have you know 70 young people, not kids but it feels like kids, but they were young people for the most part. And we would, I insisted that we had rooms where the chairs were not bolted into the ground because we were going to sit in a circle. I didn't care how we were going to do. We were going to sit in a circle so we'd have 70 people in a big, great big circle for our women's studies 101. And it was kind of amazing to me. I was very eye-opening. There was an eagerness in those students to not only know the history and the current state of affairs but to really have what they knew was already true about what it was to be a woman affirmed in a very powerful way. And then they would meet in circles and talk and just in the tradition of the women's, you know of the of consciousness raising circles and they would find themselves. It was wonderful stuff that was going on. Okay so I kept teaching. I taught at Oregon State and the University of Oregon for quite a number of years and taught many different women's studies classes and theater classes. And then I met my current wife, Kirsten, who was Kirsten Peterson at that time. And yeah, it was fabulous. We were married, we've dated for a little while, and we met on a blind date and that was kind of fun. And then we actually married in 1996. Of course that was illegal so it was not illegally recognized marriage. I have to say that. But we got married anyway. And all of our family was there and we were blessed by that. And she and I, so you know just like all married people we had to figure out what's her future going to be? What are we going to do? She was still in school so I had a little stint there as a bike mechanic because that was a fantasy of mine to be. I always loved bicycles and wheels and ever since the mouse and the motorcycle it was just something I adored. So I got to have this fantasy time where I learned how to be a bike mechanic. And I had to even fashion a resume that omitted my PhD and a lot of other things because I wouldn't have been hired. So I just kind of left a few things out and it was great. I had a couple of years with some nice guys and learned how to fix bicycles and put them together and stuff. And all of this while Kirsten was finishing her master's degree because we knew that had to happen. So anyway we like most couples and we tried to figure out where are we going to go? What are we going to do? Throughout our resumes here and there. And sure enough she scored a job and she scored a job in Ashland or in the Rogue Valley. She was a speech therapist and we thought okay there's the first good job let's go there. And she'd had family here. We thought yeah great. We came to the Rogue Valley and that meant that I had to find a job. And so that was an interesting time. I got to try to date this one a little bit. I think it was 2000. 1999. Yes around there. 1998-99. I applied and I applied and I applied. And I my resume was wonderful and powerful. And I got many interviews. I interviewed 10 times. Five of which I could absolutely identify that I was ejected because of what I look like. Because I am decidedly a lesbian. And even though I thought wow I feel like I've stepped back in time. This is remarkable. But this was very very clear to me. So this was not an easy route. And I thought okay we're going to you know something's going to land here. I know it will. Well I finally got a job. And I got a job in Josephine County as the executive director for the Women's Crisis Support Team, the WCST. They needed some help. It was a it was a big crisis time for them. The founding mother Esther Jackson who had been you know founding mothers are amazing people if you have had the pleasure of knowing some of these these incredible women. She had been the one who started that she started the Women's Crisis Support Team. The story goes out of a shoe box. They had a shoe box with the names the first name and then the last initial of the woman. So she was Esther J. And then there would be other women with just their last initial and their phone number because it was dangerous. It was extremely dangerous. And they needed to stay very very covert. But this was across always original. It was a crisis line right. It was a it was a tree of women who would respond to domestic violence when a woman was in trouble. Well eventually it formed into one of the safe houses. The many safe houses that now dot this country and are critical and an integrated part of the way that we run our communities to be honest. There's a recognition this is and it works together with the cops which is amazing. You know originally there was an adversarial relationship with the police officers. There was there was a feeling of you know conflict there. But that has since dissipated and there's a real understanding and in my time there there was a real understanding that we were helping and they were helping and we were doing a good job. So I worked at the at the Women's Crisis Support Team and helped it. Esther Jackson died and left behind a lot of work to do. There were things were undone. The shelter had a hole in it the roof. The roof was literally leaking and they were in trouble. I my first day on the several days on the job I I turned to the bookkeeper and I said well I need to see look at the books and she said well I have a checkbook. I said oh good that must mean there's money and she said yes. And I said I'm going to the bank. We started there and from there of course we built the financials out. We created the wrote the appropriate grants got the grants back on track pulled created a personnel policy created everything because there was just there wasn't there were the infrastructure had just gone gone down and we fixed the roof. So and we bought new appliances and we got things back on track again right because that's what needed to happen. Well after that I Kirsten and I she got pregnant. We had wanted to have a baby for a long time and that was super good news and you know we built a house and we just needed a baby we needed a family and we were super excited about that but what happened is that it turns out we were having twins so yes so suddenly life really okay it changed a lot and I thought I've got to get closer I can't be working in Josephine County you know sometimes 12 hours a day it was a very very big job and I thought I've got to change this I just have to change here they come so I'm doing it you know which is my usual fashion okay just do it. So I um found a what did I do there was a little there was some funny in between jobs I did a little stint with a little summer stint with the um with the bread festival which was joyous and then I did and then I worked for the Southern Oregon Humane Society teaching kindness using their doing their education program teaching kindness uh and uh and then there was this job at the university they needed a coordinator for the women's resource center I thought oh boy there it is so I went ahead through my head in and applied and it was an amazing trip I can tell you that at what I did the women's center in 2004 was in a place of crisis in turmoil um the students were in a lot of pain they felt that the administration wasn't listening to them and that rape was was uh just not being addressed at all and uh so there was a lot of incredible tension there uh I came into it thinking wow this is not this is compared to the like a women's shelter with you know where I had seen some stories and had there been women coming in that stories that I'll never repeat because they are so terrible that's the level of violence that was that we were dealing with at the women's crisis support team and I thought if I can do that I can do anything so I came into this job and it even though it was in a place of turmoil I thought this is a university and I can I can make this I can make this work and we can come together I know this and um we're going to be okay um it was a lot about listening in the first year a lot about listening and there was there um and I think that there was some concern initially that I wasn't going to do anything because I was listening and because there was um they had been the women the young women in the center had been so disenfranchised by the university they felt they were feeling pretty angry and and disempowered so it took a while for that to get to play out and for us to get into a place of confidence and and trust really but we did get there we got there pretty quickly 2005 six seven eight nine all very powerful years for the women's resource center on the campus um the uh the first there was a a period of time where there was a a real change and it should it should go uh sort of on the record at least I don't know how interesting this is but when I first came the women's resource center was in a place in the stevens union in the basement um net right next to it and this was right across from what's called digversions right now another room called digversions um it was a pretty good size space and right next to it was the what was called the q or the q r c and it had just uh been born and I find it ironic but there it was and it was this about the size of a closet and I thought yeah okay put the queer people in the closet you know here we go so so that that was the women were in the basement and the queer people were in the closet I thought this is very interesting I wonder what we can do with this right so so many so the first thing that happened is that we knew that that the q r c was being treated disrespectfully that things had to change and the students knew this and they were gonna they were gonna have that that was gonna happen so there was a a year where the women's resource center was displaced into um a funny office and it was kind of a displacement year and in the process um the q r c the the whole lower floor was just gutted they just tore it up and then they split it in half basically and the women's resource center was one half of this long section and the q r c was the other the other part of it much better much more dignified and good the students were um I we we entered discussions about moving everything upward there was some resistance from some of the students some of the students wanted to stay low and kind of lay low they didn't feel safe and they said this is a place where people can go women can come here and they can get help and they've been sexually assaulted and they don't you know want to be up in the you know that this is the kind of it's down low kind of place is a good place for it and um but there anyway that story that that there was and it meant with the counter argument was what gee you know let's be proud let's get up out of the basement here let's get into the light so there were this was an ongoing piece and then the multicultural resource center was born upstairs so and then the commuter resource center was born so all these student centers just kind of were born of the women's resource center you know which had the history which was the oldest and was kind of the mother really well that's what it was um we were also very powerful painting of the t-shirts are why are t-shirts important I don't know they travel through time they're like it's ephemera of a sort you know they're deteriorating I mean look at this thing this thing's coming apart it's a mess rosemary's got some I've seen some of her t-shirts and they are so old and ragged some of them are just pieces of you know what there this is wcst so this is back you know to josephine county to that shelter that one you know women's shelter right and then this this thing look at this see this now I had to bring just one of my oldest right look at that stone wall see how rag bag that is it's coming apart because it just you know so what you get what do you have you have a tangible uh kind of trail of uh challenge and um victory and progress and pain and glory all and it is a bunch of freaking t-shirts you know isn't that a gas you know and then of course you know coalition right so I brought this one just to remember that nobody ever does it by themselves right you're always part of you know was part of the earth and part of everything it just isn't it just doesn't work that way so not not for women not for men not for anybody so you know this was a fave of mine because it's a little bloody they like that one to be kind of you know same purple right you know oops ah there we go right on there we go so that's how that works yeah so we created these different programs to really honor all the ways in which women were in the world and one of them was called circle of fire coalition women and it was all built around coalition the fundamental value in the women's resource center which was that we work with others we are not a silo we we reach tentacles out to all different kinds of of people to to men to indigenous people to you know we wanted to to the to the qrc there was this was the programs that came out of circle of fire were about that were about working in coalition and understanding the value and the power of that and then we had something called vivacious voices empowerment through education and expression and that was vivacious voices was about creativity and we did amazing things and probably the banner creative piece out of that was a program called Athena in velvet which was this this event this wild creative women's event that would happen once a year full of music and poetry and goddesses and it was just incredible and in comedy and it was wonderful and then changing woman health and wellness and that of course was around body and the power of our body and the it had things like our our support groups our body image groups yeah that was and fertility awareness workshop that's right yeah there were all these different programs that came and then were organized around around that another program new era liberty and justice for all and that was our justice program really and it was we we really celebrated the anniversary of real Wade we the women in leadership conference would happen out of new era it was about leadership and about the kind of the politics really you know and then we had sa fe safe creating a sexual assault free environment so an entire program dedicated toward creating safety for women and responding to sexual assault we had self-defense workshops we did r.a. trainings we did domestic violence awareness month we did a sad sexual assault survivors groups and of course we provided advocacy and then we did the vagina monologues annually which was an incredible fundraiser we were able to give away you know about fifty thousand sixty thousand dollars to different organizations we created a actually a fund over in the foundation there's a foundation account i don't know what happened to that about twenty two twenty four thousand dollars that was over there with the idea that we would eventually be create a scholarship fund so it was very effective very powerful and we worked together with the sexual assault response team the the community response team the sexual assault and did something called yell it tell it stop sexual assault campaign so so that was a very effective i the main thing i want to underline about this is that i i was never i mean coordinator was the right was the right name for for me i was wished i'd been called a director but i didn't direct anything i was just the coordinator i was like the catch system and i would make things look pretty you know organize them a little bit and stuff like that and i was there to be the consistency and the protector and the steward of the women's resource center i was what i i was the part that the women could count on women on campus and and quite a few men too that was that was my role other than that they did everything you know they really did and they brought the the young women and young men would bring their energy and their power and their creativity and their intelligence and their joy and their sorrow a lot of pain a lot of growing up that was happening as i spoke to the morning earlier the you know there is that final stage of human development that is so powerful when a young woman comes in as a where she's been you know a high school young woman a girl and then she goes to college and those years you know between 18 and 22 23 are so powerfully formative they're just incredible the trajectory is is amazing and you would see these these new young women who had come in very young and they by the time they would reach their junior and senior year they were raring to go i have never the the power and the fortitude and the clarity was stunning and you would watch this transformation into womanhood that's what was going on these women were getting their feet underneath them and and i just got to i just got to be there to see it and to guide it and to make sure it happened as in in a way that was as the most supportive that that could be right and of course they would support each other they were profound supports for each other there were friendships that were made at the women's resource center that continue and endure because because they were that powerful we were ingenious and tricky we did there was a there's a story that i can i can relate a few stories and one story is like this there was a fellow who came on campus and we can in in front of the union there's a free speech plaza he was a provocateur well he stood out there on and he would stand out there at the while the kids while the young people would pass by the students would pass by and he would say terrible terrible things about the shaming women's bodies that they were sin the original sin of eve and it was just and so he was and it was worse than that i don't need to actually repeat the the way in which he spoke but he was basically saying that that full of misogyny full of homophobia and so much so that the students were just you know usually students would kind of block do a certain amount of blocking out just go to camp you know i'm not in my class you know and but this guy was really nasty and i saw young men and young women engage him and try to find some way to get you know can you speak intelligently can i talk to you know and they would fight him you know verbally fight him and engage him and nothing nothing seemed to make a difference this went on and on for for probably a week or more it was it was quite a while it was a protected free speech space so and when the students had designated that and that you know that's what that was well at a certain point my young women had had enough they were feeling that it was harming people they were really aware and they were really acutely aware of the way it was hurting the people in the qrc the students in the gay lesbian queer union that because of this this really hateful rhetoric that was going on and they got together and we got together in the women's center we called a circle what are we going to do well well what are we going to do they said let's go make so much noise that no one can hear him anymore that's what they decided to do and i said okay that's what and there's an example really of empowerment right i didn't make that decision this is the women working together thing this is what we're going to do this is how we're going to address this and this is what we're going to do i thought okay so i accompanied everybody up we went you know 20 of us and we formed a circle around this guy and we danced and we sang and we shouted and we had tambourines and we were banging some pans and we made so much noise that he could not be heard at all and we did this for a good i don't know 45 minutes or more finally the the vice president of student affairs john eldrich comes out and he his eyes are big like this and he comes up to me and he says deltra please let them know that if they don't stop they'll be arrested i said oh okay and so i i turned to one woman in the circle i said we need to stop because we'll be arrested and she passed it around very quiet you know very calmly passed it around everybody looked at me and i said let's go so away we so we filed a little bit of a distance away the vice president that this point john eldrich said so he and a security card accompanied this man and said i'm good we're going to have to take you off of campus because and he said well this is a free speech space and he said yes but you've disrupted classes they can't hear in taylor hall and it's disrupting classes so you have to leave and off they went and they they i can still remember they walked up toward the library and my women you know we all looked at each other and as soon as they were far enough away we went down to the women's resource center and everybody who was around was watching and going wow that was fantastic i mean it was complete victory we went down into the you know down into the women's resource center the queue was going away to go away to go it was perfect it was a perfect solution elegantly done no violence took care of business they were something i'll tell you so uh that's an example of of the power out of the women's resource center we were looked to to keep to really um draw the line to be on the edge where things were a little dangerous and a little bit uncomfortable and they and we did we did that we created a sexual assault network all the way across campus trained a whole bunch of people on how to respond the basics of responding when a woman or man uh is comes and is sexually assaulted and and what how do you plug into this network to bring her to the services and the resources that she needs so so we were we were willing to dive in to the to the pain we weren't gonna we weren't gonna just stay on the outside there was a lot a lot of joy but there was also big pain in that in that first step into the adult world right it's a big deal it was a really big deal um and um i i just want to i just want to make sure that it's understood how how much i really love those women and i regarded them highly i regarded them highly it is it is so wonderful to see a woman get powerful it's just so wonderful and you know i think that's really the heart of feminism right because i always used to say to my women's studies 101 students i said look this is so much bigger than me it's so much bigger than any of us as individuals if i didn't know that you guys weren't going to go out there and keep doing the work of liberation and and and do and and freeing and and and and protecting and um empowering uh women i if you weren't if i didn't know that you guys were going to go out there if try to speak again if i if i didn't know that you all all of you young people we're not going to go out there and continue this work i just fold up and and that would be the end of me and i and i'd be in despair but you see i'm not in despair oh contraire i feel joy because that's exactly what's going to happen you're going to go out there and you're going to change keep changing the world that's what's going to happen and and so you see really big hard things can be tackled when people like that and you can count on it and i can count on it right so that's the joy of my work yep