Saturday, May 8, 2010 at 12:09PM

the bold and beautiful young Margaret

Today marks the 50th anniversary of the birth control pill. I'm taken back to my late 20s, founding with Barbara Jordan and within two years 60 women the first upstate NY chapter of N.O.W. Shirley Mirow of Planned Parenthood, Janet Gleason of Corning Community College, Father Murphy Priest at St. Mary's Church - - together we began. Here's a bit of the story.Margaret Sanger was born in Corning New York. Her birth and education records were hard to find in the Catholic parish, ashamed to be the source of Margaret's pioneering. A small group of women, formed a chapter of N.O.W. and together unearthed her past, the house in which she grew up, the story of her family, her biographers were located, interviewed, and slowly the town that did not want to own her now has a collection of her work in its community college and one can see someone point to her home on the southside hill. During the days we fought (carrying petitions) to have her named into the local Hall of Fame - she did not qualify before the first woman to cross the Rockies, we faced opposition and were often shouted down as we approached the schools to speak of her sacrifices and contributions. Cornell let me speak, CCC's Prof of Human Sexual Behavior allowed a forum each year, Planned Parenthood tip toed into play and Corning's most famous citizen is now known. The Planned Parenthood clinic now bears her name on it's bright blue banner, but for years her name was seen as too controversial, the Mother of the Pill (in a way) could not be named nor claimed. In the most recent biography, it is written - after she left Corning, when passing through on her travels, she would become ill. We were a proud group in the late 70s, early 80s to promote the woman whom Gail Collins reminds us today, opened a door for women to demand their right to birth control.comments published in NYTimes today: May 8, 9:24 a.m. 2010 (jbirch)shared by Collins:important links to Margaret Sanger archives, at Smith College and New York University:



">http://www.nyu.edu/projects/sanger/">