Frances Perkins
1880–1965
The first woman in a U.S. Cabinet — she built Social Security, minimum wage, and the 40-hour week.
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She was standing on the sidewalk in 1911, watching the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory burn, when she learned the exit doors had been locked from the outside. 146 people died that day, and it never left her. She later said it was "seared on my mind as well as my heart."
She carried that fire into the halls of power and turned it into law. Safer factories. The eight-hour workday. Unemployment insurance. A minimum wage. Social Security. She fought for every one of them, and won. When Roosevelt offered her the cabinet position in 1933 - the first woman ever appointed to a U.S. president's cabinet - she didn't immediately say yes. She went home, made a list of everything she intended to accomplish, and said she'd only take the job if he agreed to all of it. Every single item got done.
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The Artist
Jacqueline Viola
Interdisciplinary Artist
Jacqueline Viola Moulton (she/her) is an interdisciplinary artist, writer, and scholar whose work focuses around public, participatory, and performative poetry practices. Moulton has as Bachelor of Arts, a Masters in Art and Culture, and is currently is a Ph.D. candidate studying philosophy and aesthetics at the Institute for Doctoral Studies in the Visual Arts. Jacqueline makes and publishes queer, experimental, and posthuman philosophy and poetry zines under the moniker, The Depressed Waitress. Moulton's creative practice includes performance, installation art, illustration, and literary arts - exhibiting work most recently at Cottonwood Center for the Arts, Kreuser Gallery, G44 Gallery, Volcano Art Center, Dear Artist Project, and House Guest Gallery. Within scholarship, Moulton has just published a chapter in the book Pearl Jam and Philosophy by Bloomsbury. Moulton's creative work is showcased in one full length poetry text. Other essays, poems, and nonfiction is published in literary journals, anthologies, and magazines, including The Northwest Review, Andrews McMeel Publishing, Real Change Newspaper, New River Press, Beautiful Minds Unite, Beyond Words, Routledge Publishing, and others.
