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MONDAY • SEPTEMBER 1 • 2014
LABOR DAY
A LIFETIME OF WORK Richard Gwin/Journal-World Photo
As they retire, the first generation of women to enter the workforce en masse reflect on the changes they’ve seen By Kim Callahan kcallahan@ljworld.com
“Why are you here? Why aren’t you married?” Judy Roitman recalls the young man’s hostile interrogation as not so much a question
as an invitation to scram. It was 40-odd years ago, and, it was just one in a torrent of antagonistic remarks, dismissive looks and cold shoulders directed at her, but it lodged in her memory as emblematic. “My stomach hurt every day
Profile of working women Percent distribution of women in civilian labor force, aged 25 to 64 years, by educational attainment, 1970 and 2010
Less than a high school diploma
in grad school,” she says of her years at the University of California at Berkeley in the early 1970s. “It was terrible.” She and the young man were fellow graduate students, in their 20s, and the answer to his question — why was she there instead of being married? — was that, like him, she wanted to be a mathematician. She wanted to have a career, and like many women of her generation — the first to enter the professional workplace in sizeable numbers — she saw no reason why she couldn’t do that and pursue all the other life experiences that were available to men, including having a family. Roitman is 68 now. She retired this year from Kansas University, after a distinguished career that saw her become a fellow of the American Mathematical Society, an honor bestowed for outstanding contributions to the advancement of mathematics. And she’s also a grandmother. As she looks back on the last
Some college, or associate degree College graduates Source: U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics
INSIDE
Storms Business Classified Comics Deaths
Low: 64
Today’s forecast, page 10A
8A 6B-10B 11B 2A
Special to the Journal-World
RECENTLY RETIRED LAWRENCE RESIDENTS, clockwise from top, pictured now and when they entered the workforce, are Dana Hale, vice president of nursing at Lawrence Memorial Hospital; Judy Roitman, a Kansas University professor of mathematics; and Susan Hadl, Please see WORKING, page 7A a sergeant in the Lawrence Police Department.
High school graduates, no college
High: 88
Richard Gwin/Journal-World Photo
Events listings Horoscope Opinion Puzzles
6A, 2B Sports 12B Television 9A 12B
1B-5B 10A, 2B
Body found in park
Vol.156/No.244 22 pages
Police are investigating after a man’s decomposing body was found by a couple driving through Constant Park Sunday afternoon. Page 2A
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