The alumni newsletter of Antioch College Fall 2004
The alumni newsletter of Antioch College Fall 2004
For Barbara Winslow ’68, activism and Antioch have always been connected. She was initially drawn to Antioch because of its activist spirit and reputation as a radical institution. She wanted to attend a college that reflected her beliefs and interests, and when she visited other colleges, but she found their progressive spirit to be lacking. When it came time to apply, Barbara was only interested in Antioch.
Barbara grew up in Scarsdale, an affluent, primarily white suburb of New York City. She hated it so much that her parents sent her to a progressive private school in New Hope, Pennsylvania. In high school she began her involvement in the Civil Rights movement, protesting racial discrimination at Woolworth’s and the Cuban missile crisis at the United Nations. She says of her high school: “It put me on the path to Antioch.”
Barbara’s activism continued at Antioch. While her parents were supportive of her ideals (her mother was active in the League of Women Voters and played a role in changing New York’s voter registration laws) they had some concerns about Barbara actively participating in these movements. “I wanted to go south for Freedom Summer, but you had to have your parent’s permission if you were under 21. My parents’ didn’t allow me to go.” Still, Barbara continued to exert pressure. “I was thrown out at a demonstration against Hubert Humphrey. The New York Times journalist William Apple was the first to be thrown out, and I was thrown out second, right on top of him.” Apple asked if she was hurt, to which Barbara responded “I don’t need any help, I’m a liberated woman.” When Barbara’s parents read Apple’s article recounting the scene, they were more concerned with her well-being than with her feminist politics.
But Barbara’s politics did make an impression. In 1998, Barbara’s mother established the Barbara Slaner Winslow Endowed Scholarship in Women’s Studies in her honor. “It was her last Christmas present to me before she died, and it was the most meaningful.”
When she arrived at Antioch, Barbara recalls feeling overwhelmed. “Everyone was so brilliant and confident." Barbara majored in history and loved her history and literature classes. She credits co-op with teaching her to live communally and co-operatively. “My first co-op taught me everything co-op should teach you. It was my first time out on my own and I lived with a group of women. I had to learn about buying food, about sharing household responsibilities, but mostly how to get along with different people.”
Barbara’s first co-op was as an assistant gym teacher at Hubbard Woods grade school outside Chicago. She co-oped again as a teacher’s aide at the Irvington House in New York University Hospital. There, she taught students who were in recovery from various heart problems. This was during the height of the Civil Rights and Black Power movements in New York City and most of Barbara’s students were people of color. She laughs, recalling how they taught her to dance, “They said, ‘You can’t dance Miss Barbara.’ This was before the stereotype of white people can’t dance, but the kids taught me.”
Her other co-ops included work with an ad agency in New York City. There she worked closely with a stylist and even did some modeling. “I learned a lot about fashion and began to think seriously about issues of women and gender.” Barbara used this experience to land a co-op in London at another ad agency. “I loved living and working in London,” Barbara says. Following that co-op, Barbara participated in Antioch Education Abroad, staying in London and taking history classes at the University of Leeds.
After returning to the US, Barbara married. Her husband graduated from Antioch and began graduate studies at the University of Washington. “At that time, women followed their husbands,” she says of her decision to leave Antioch. Barbara accompanied him and finished her BA at the University of Washington, where she was active in the local anti-Vietnam war movement as well as Students for a Democratic Society. Barbara went on to earn two Master’s degrees, in labor history and comparative labor history, and a PhD in women’s history.
In 1967, she was one of the founders of Women’s Liberation Seattle, an early women’s liberation group that played an important role in liberalizing abortion rights in Washington.
Barbara went on to live what she calls “a kind of double life” as both a college professor and activist. She remained involved in women’s rights organizations such as the Reproductive Rights National Network and the Cleveland Pro-Choice Action Committee, often finding other Antiochians working within those organizations. She returned several times to Antioch to speak and teach classes. She was, and still is, a speaker at feminist conferences around the globe.
Currently, Barbara is a professor in the School of Education, the coordinator of the Secondary Social Studies Program as well as coordinator of the Women’s Studies Program at Brooklyn College of the City University of New York. “So I’m very coordinated,” she jokes. At the time this article was written, she had just returned from a conference in Rome, where she presented a paper on women’s oral histories.
Barbara is still very involved with Antioch, saying “The College sticks with you and lives on in you. A deeper appreciation comes after leaving.” Since 1995 she has been on the University Board of Trustees, and is now serving her third term. She recalls being recruited for the board during the time the Sexual Offense Prevention Policy (SOPP) was being developed. “I was in full support of the SOPP. I suggested that the cast of SNL speak at Commencement to show that Antioch has a sense of humor, but the students declined my suggestion.”
Barbara welcomes Antioch students into her home in New York during co-ops and after they graduate. “When my daughters were young, I said they were there to help take care of them, but now my girls are grown-up, so I say the students are there to take care of me.” She also provides temporary lodgings for protesters and students in New York for other events. “On one Pride weekend I had about 25 students staying in my house.”
Another way Barbara has helped to promote activism in Antiochians was the endowing of a co-op scholarship position at the North Star Fund, a progressive foundation that funds grassroots organizations in New York City. Its Executive Director was a close friend, Betty Kapetanakis ’74. Barbara served on the board of North Star for 11 years and chaired it for 7 years. When Betty was tragically killed in 2002, Barbara decided to honor her legacy. The scholarship not only preserves Betty’s memory, it involves Antioch students in grassroots activism in New York City.
Barbara has been extremely generous to Antioch and has high hopes for its future. “I think the Renewal Commission’s report is very promising and I believe if we get the right president for the job it will be very successful. My hope for the new president is that she or he will be ambitious, in the good sense of the word, will want to have Antioch regain its prominence in the field of higher education. In order to do that, the president will have to be very bold, innovative, creative—but mainly bold. And committed to an institution like Antioch.”
Victor Ayoub ’49
Yellow Springs, OH
Bruce P. Bedford
Treasurer * Palm City, FL
Frances Bond
Baltimore, MD
Amy S. Chappell ’73
Indianapolis, IN
David Crippens ’64
Inglewood, CA
Sandra K. Deming ’82 AUSC
Rancho Palo Verdes, CA
Leo A. Drey ’39
Trustee Emeritus * St.Louis, MO
Daniel Fallon ’61
New York, NY
John D. Feinberg ’70
Ex-officio * Boulder, CO
President, Antioch College Alumni Association
Diane Brou Fraser ’68
Jackson, MS
Everette Freeman ’72
Indianapolis, IN
Sherwood Guernsey II ’75 ALS
Pittsfield, MA
Reuben T. Harris ’69
Keene, NH
Hal Joseph ’54
Indian Wells, CA
Daniel J. Kaplan ’76
Chair * Westmoreland, NH
Jeffrey C. Kasch ’65
Milwaukee, WI
Robert A. Levin ’42
Trustee Emeritus * Albuquerque, NM
Lillian Pierson Lovelace ’51
Trustee Emeritus * Santa Barbara, CA
Niels P. Lyster ’54
Indianapolis, IN
Thomas A. McNicol ’02 McG*
Springfield, OH
Laura Markham ’80
Brooklyn, NY
John G. Merselis Jr. ’96 ANE
Williamstown, MA
Peter H. Ostrander ’72
Seattle, WA
Larry Stone ’64
Oakton, VA
Jordan Tamagni ’84
New York, NY
Kay W. Thomson ’95 ANE
Pocasset, MA
Paula A. Treichler ’65
Champaign, IL
Barbara Slaner Winslow ’68
Vice Chair * Brooklyn, NY
Arthur J. Zucker ’55
Secretary * Raleigh, NC