Our Missouri

Episode 72: From Hartville to the Hall of Fame (Title IX in Missouri, Part 4)

The lessons learned in Hartville in Wright County impacted Dr. Mary Jo Wynn for the rest of her life. In this episode, host Sean Rost, as well as several participants in the Missouri Sports & Recreation Oral History Project, highlight key moments in Wynn's hall of fame career, including her efforts to expand educational and athletic opportunities for women far beyond the campus of Missouri State University.

Episode Image: Dr. Mary Jo Wynn, SMSU Sports Report, December-January 1978-1979 [Courtesy of Linda Dollar]

Episode 71: Red Heads, Co-Eds, & Hillbillies (Title IX in Missouri, Part 3)

In this episode, host Sean Rost highlights some of the 1930s and 1940s barnstorming women's basketball teams and players from Missouri, and introduces listeners to Wisconsinite Helen Onson, a former player for several of these teams whose papers and oral history are at the State Historical Society of Missouri.

For a link for the "Out of the Stacks" On Demand program referenced in the episode, check out: https://shsmo.org/on-demand/out-of-the-stacks 

Episode Image: Players of the Helen Stephens Olympic Co-Eds basketball team, date unknown [Helen Onson Papers (C4043), SHSMO]

Episode 70: Play Days (Title IX in Missouri, Part 2)

To compete or not to compete—that was the question educators and athletes debated nationwide between the 1920s-1970s. In the latest Our Missouri episode, learn about how Play Days in Missouri fit into this debate on athletic opportunities for women.

Episode Image: Volleyball game at Kirkwood High School, Kirkwood, Missouri, 1969 [Francis Scheidegger Collection (S0809), SHSMO]

Episode 69: Introduction (Title IX in Missouri, Part 1)

In this episode, host Sean Rost opens the Title IX in Missouri series with an overview of the early history behind the landmark legislation, and introduces listeners to some of the athletes, coaches, and administrators featured in the Missouri Sports & Recreation Oral History Project.

Episode Image: Girls playing soccer at North Junior High School in Kirkwood, Missouri, 1962 [Francis Scheidegger Collection (S0809), SHSMO]

Summer Series 2022: Marjorie Paxson (NWMC, Part 4)

This episode features excerpts from an oral history conversation between Marjorie “Marj” Paxson and Jean Gaddy Wilson recorded in 2007 for the National Women and Media Collection’s 20^th Anniversary. Wilson talks with Paxson about her career in media, her role in the establishment of the National Women and Media Collection (NWMC), and her views on the state of journalism for women at the turn of the 21^st Century.

Episode & Banner Image: Marjorie B. Paxson, ca. 1950s [Marjorie B. Paxson Papers (C4078), SHSMO]

About the Guests:

MARJORIE “MARJ” PAXSON

Marjorie “Marj” Bowers Paxson was born on August 13, 1923, in Houston, Texas. She attended Rice University in Houston for two years, where she worked on the student newspaper, the Thresher. In 1942 Paxson transferred to the University of Missouri and graduated in 1944. While at the University of Missouri, she worked on the Columbia Missourian. Over the course of her journalistic career, she held various reporting, editorial, and publishing positions at the United Press, Associated Press, Houston Post, Houston Chronicle, Miami Herald, St. Petersburg Times, Philadelphia Bulletin, Idaho Statesman, Chambersburg Public Opinion, and Muskogee Phoenix. Paxson was also named editor of Xilonen, an eight-page daily newspaper published for the United Nations World Conference for International Women’s Year held in Mexico City in 1975. She retired in 1986 and continued writing a column for the Muskogee Phoenix until 2004. In 1987, Paxson donated $50,000 and her personal papers to help establish the National Women and Media Collection at the Western Historical Manuscript Collection (now administered by the State Historical Society of Missouri). Marjorie “Marj” Paxson died on June 17, 2017.

JEAN GADDY WILSON

Jean Gaddy Wilson is a professional consultant who has spoken on five continents and who spent fourteen years as a Professor of Journalism at the University of Missouri. She is a co-author, along with Brian S. Brooks and James L. Pinson, of the journalism textbook Working With Words: A Handbook for Media Writers and Editors. She is the founder of New Directions for News, an innovation think tank, at the University of Missouri School of Journalism, and her work led to the founding of the Journalism and Women Symposium (JAWS) and the International Women’s Media Foundation. She co-founded the National Women and Media Collection (NWMC) with Gannett publisher Marj Paxson and the Western Historical Manuscript Collection (now administered by the State Historical Society of Missouri).

Summer Series 2022: In Their Own Words – Elizabeth Engel, Laura Jolley, Aleksandra Kinlen, and Heather Richmond (NWMC, Part 3)

Elizabeth Engel, Laura Jolley, Aleksandra Kinlen, and Heather Richmond from The State Historical Society of Missouri join us to discuss their involvement in the creation of the exhibit, “In Their Own Words: Celebrating the National Women and Media Collection,” The exhibit is on display in the Wenneker Family Corridor Gallery at the Center for Missouri Studies from July to December 2022.

Episode & Banner Image: Marie Anderson and Robert Applegate, ca. 1958 [Marie Anderson Papers (C4074), SHSMO]

About the Guests:

Elizabeth Engel is a senior archivist for the State Historical Society of Missouri and manages the National Women in Media Collection. Engel is one of four curators of In Their Own Words: Celebrating the National Women and Media Collection. Engel, an Iowa native and a University of Iowa graduate, holds a master's degree in library and information science. Her undergraduate work was in English at Iowa State University. She has been with the State Historical Society since 2006 and currently heads the Columbia Research Center’s accessioning program, working with donors to acquire manuscript collections.

Laura Jolley is the assistant director of manuscripts for the State Historical Society of Missouri and one of four curators of In Their Own Words: Celebrating the National Women and Media Collection. Jolley holds a master's degree in library science and a bachelor of arts degree in English from the University of Missouri. She has been at SHSMO for over 14 years and currently oversees the collecting and preservation efforts of the Society.

Aleksandra Kinlen is a manuscript specialist for the State Historical Society of Missouri and one of four curators of In Their Own Words: Celebrating the National Women and Media Collection. Kinlen earned a bachelor’s degree in education and a master’s degree in history from Missouri State University. Currently pursuing a master’s degree in library and information science at the University of Missouri–Columbia, she joined SHSMO as a practicum student before becoming a manuscript specialist in April 2021.

Heather Richmond is a senior archivist for the State Historical Society of Missouri and one of four curators of In Their Own Words: Celebrating the National Women and Media Collection. Richmond received a master's degree in library studies with an emphasis in archives from the University of Wisconsin-Madison in 2007. Her undergraduate work was in creative writing and psychology at Beloit College. Richmond has been with SHSMO for nearly 10 years and currently oversees the Society's digitization program.

Summer Series 2022: Women’s Page Journalism & Soft News – Kimberly Voss (NWMC, Part 2)

Dr. Kimberly Voss joins us to talk about her writings on women in journalism, particularly her books on Women’s Pages in newspapers and how she utilized the National Women and Media Collection for her research.

Episode & Banner Image: Miami (FL) Herald newspaper staff, ca. 1950s [Dorothy Misener Journey Papers (C3904), SHSMO]

About the Guest: Dr. Kimberly Voss earned a PhD in Mass Communications and Journalism from the University of Maryland. Presently, she is a Professor of Journalism at the Nicholson School of Communication and Media at the University of Central Florida. She is the author of several books, including “The Food Section: Newspaper Women and the Culinary Community,” “Politicking Politely: Well-Behaved Women Making a Difference in the 1960s and 1970s,” and “Re-Evaluating Women’s Page Journalism in the Post-World War II Era: Celebrating Soft News.” She is the co-author of “Mad Men & Working Women: Feminist Perspectives on Historical Power, Resistance and Otherness.”

Summer Series 2022: Origins - Jean Gaddy Wilson (NWMC, Part 1)

Established in 1987 and celebrating its 35th anniversary in 2022, the National Women and Media Collection documents the roles women have played in media fields, as employees and leaders as well as subjects of news coverage, how those roles have altered over time, and how attitudes of and towards women have changed. The Collection includes records of women’s organizations and professional and personal papers of women journalists, editors, book authors, newspaper and magazine publishers, media company CEOs, journalism and mass communication educators, press secretaries, and public relations personnel, as well as radio, television, and film producers and personalities. To celebrate this important anniversary, and coincide with the opening of the new National Women and Media exhibit in the Wenneker Family Corridor Gallery at the Center for Missouri Studies, the Our Missouri Podcast dedicates its Summer Series to the women featured within the collection and exhibit, as well as the journalists, scholars, archivists, and librarians who have pioneered and preserved its materials. This episode features excerpts from an oral history with Jean Gaddy Wilson recorded in 2022 for the National Women and Media Collection.

Episode Image: Marjorie Paxson, Jean Gaddy Wilson, and Nancy Lankford, date unknown [Marjorie B. Paxson Papers (C4078), SHSMO]

About the Guest: Jean Gaddy Wilson is a professional consultant who has spoken on five continents and who spent fourteen years as a Professor of Journalism at the University of Missouri. She is a co-author, along with Brian S. Brooks and James L. Pinson, of the journalism textbook “Working With Words: A Handbook for Media Writers and Editors.” She is the founder of New Directions for News, an innovation think tank, at the University of Missouri School of Journalism, and her work led to the founding of the Journalism and Women Symposium (JAWS) and the International Women’s Media Foundation. She co-founded the National Women and Media Collection with Gannett publisher Marj Paxson and the Western Historical Manuscript Collection (now affiliated with the State Historical Society of Missouri).

Episode 68: Ensign Fountains (Water & Waterways, Part 8)

This episode features host Sean Rost discussing the National Humane Alliance and its efforts to distribute and construct multiple Ensign Fountains in Missouri in the early 20th Century.

Episode Image: Ensign Fountain, Clinton, Missouri, 2019 [Courtesy of Sean Rost]

Episode 67: “The Thunderbird Spirit” – Andrew Olden (Water & Waterways, Part 7)

This episode features Andrew Olden discussing Civilian Conservation Corps Company 1743, an African American unit based at Washington State Park along the banks of the Big River near Desoto, Missouri, in the mid-1930s.

Episode Image: Thunderbird Lodge, Washington State Park, 2021 [Courtesy of Andrew Olden]

About the Guest: Andrew Olden is a PhD Candidate in History at the University of Missouri.