"When I got my first job with United Press in 1944, World War Two was in full swing. The men had gone off to fight, so the wire service had to hire women. To get that job, I signed a waiver agreeing to give it up when the man I was replacing returned from the service. Thousands of women all over the country signed those waivers. That would not happen today. But when you understand the mores and attitudes of this country in 1944, signing the waiver was the accepted thing to do. Journalists need that historical perspective. It is important to the story." --Marjorie Bowers Paxson "What I was striving for - and will continue to seek - is a way to arouse editors, maybe even excite them, to consider the problems they face in reporting women's issues." --Dorothy M. Jurney "There is no way the world's communications problems are going to be solved if women--51% of the population--are not included in the solutions, both in the selection of solutions and in their implementations." --Donna Allen

The National Women and Media Collection documents the roles women have played and are playing in media fields, both as media employees and as objects of coverage, how those roles have altered over time, and how attitudes of and towards women have changed. The NWMC includes the records of women's organizations and the professional and personal papers of: women journalists-reporters, correspondents, and columnists educators-professors of journalism, mass communication, public relations, and advertising editors and publishers of newspapers and magazines radio, television, and film producers and personalities press secretaries public relations personnel advertising associates These papers document: the professional lives of women working in media fields coverage of women's issues the women's press news by and about women media stereotypes gender and race discrimination portrayal of women in advertising national and international women's conferences activities of women's organizations The activities and contributions of women in American media fields can only be adequately documented if original source materials are available. Thus, for the National Women and Media Collection we are seeking -- professional correspondence and papers, including job descriptions and guidelines pertaining to women's jobs personal correspondence with family members and friends diaries, memoirs, and speeches research files audio and video tapes and cassettes records of women's organizations minutes reports proceedings membership records programs committee files identified photographs If you have, or know of, papers and other documents you believe would be suitable for the National Women and Media Collection, we would like to hear from you. For further information contact: Western Historical Manuscript Collection 23 Ellis Library University of Missouri Columbia, MO 65201-5149 573/882-6028 whmc@umsystem.edu The National Women and Media Collection is a joint venture of the University of Missouri School of Journalism and the Western Historical Manuscript Collection, which comprises the holdings of both the University and the State Historical Society of Missouri. Marjorie Bowers-Paxson -- MU graduate, longtime newspaperwoman, and retired Gannett publisher -- established the NWMC in 1987 with a monetary donation and the gift of her own papers. Click to view the title list for the National Women & Media Collection.