“We were trying to be incredibly inclusive,” she said. “We have adventurers. We have activists. Every kind of person accomplishment.”
Tietjan comes to Central New York for several appearances this week. On Wednesday, Sept. 17, 6 p.m., she’ll be at the National Women’s Hall of Fame, 76 Fall St., Seneca Falls (568-8060) for a free book signing and talk. On Thursday, Sept. 18, noon, she’ll speak at a luncheon at the Craftsman Inn, 7300 E. Genesee St., Fayetteville (471-1987); tickets cost $27. On Saturday, Sept. 10, 1:30 p.m., she’ll be at Creekside Books, 25 Fennell St., Skaneateles (685-0379), for a free talk and book signing. And Tietjan wraps her upstate New York tour Sunday, Sept. 21, 3 p.m., at the Women’s Community Building, 100 W. Seneca St., Ithaca ((607) 273-5055), at yet another free talk and book signing.
Tietjan, an electrical engineer and historian on scientific and technical women, began working on Her Story when Charlotte Waisman approached her with the idea in 2003. Waisman, a political activist and teacher for the Women’sVision Foundation in Denver, was teaching a leadership development class when the idea for the book sprang from a disturbing case of disillusionment. Her class, which was made up of mostly middle-age, mid-management corporate workers, never seemed to relate to her when she spoke about historic American females.
“They would look at me very blankly, and it was very clear that they had no idea who came before us,” said Waisman. Determined to educate her students, Waisman went to a library to find a book that comprehensively noted the great American female contributors, but could only find novels that highlighted women in specific fields of work. Also, no books featured biographies of women in a timeline format, Waisman noted.
She began compiling a spreadsheet of women’s names that she believed were worthy of exposure, and had about 300 when she met Tietjan. Tietjan, who had a strong knowledge of great scientific and technical American women, perfectly complemented Waisman’s familiarity of female artists, writers and composers, Waisman said. “It was something about our connection with one another that was very powerful.”
After officially starting work on the book in April 2003, Waisman and Tietjan narrowed a list of more than 4,000 women down to 866. They extensively researched each, and after writing her mini-biography placing their accomplishment in the context of their time, they finished the book in October 2007.
The book features colorful pictures of the women that fill each page, including Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi; Admiral Grace Murray Hopper, who developed the first computer compiler and English-based computer language; and Aretha Franklin. “We do have a handful of women in the book that some would consider to be controversial, {but} by and large, our intention was to provide positive role models,” said Tietjan.
With positive feedback from fans of the novel—“It’s amazing to me {how people} just relate to it,” noted Tietjan—both she and Waisman are hoping to write a second edition. Although they have more than 200 women already in mind for the next edition, they’ve made a link on the books’ Web site, www.herstoryatimeline.com, under which viewers can nominate a woman for the new book.
Although plans for the second edition’s release are still indefinite, there’s one aspect of Her Story that cannot be rescinded, noted Tietjan. “We’re getting these women written back into history.”
—Alex Kish
