Blog

By Ellen Shubart, Class of 2006

Think of a stop on Chicago’s L. It’s likely named for the street below, which itself is most often named for a man. In the Loop around downtown Chicago, stops are named for Presidents — Madison, Adams, Jackson, “famous” players in U.S. history – New York’s Governor DeWitt Clinton, or intersections – Clark and Lake, State and Lake.

What about taking a different perspective on the transit map, with stops named for the women who played roles in Chicago’s history, the arts, social services, and architecture?

That’s what Janet Volk, Class of 2019 (“I’m a proud Bovine”) has done with an exciting new endeavor, The Women’s L Project. Using the classic map of the Chicago Transit Authority’s extensive system with all its colorful lines, she has changed the name of each station to honor a woman who lived or worked near that stop.

Volk, who admits to taking inspiration from a similar project in New York City. Using her  knowledge as a docent for CAC’s L tour (“it’s my favorite tour”) Janet used last year’s pandemic lockdown to research Chicago’s exceptional women.  She first looked at society’s “celebrities” – Michelle Obama, Oprah Winfrey, Jane Addams – and then “discovered others I had never heard of who had done incredible work,” she explains.

Volk wanted to include not only women who excelled, but those who lived or worked near the L.  As a result, stops along the Purple Line, for example, are named for women from Evanston.

One example of a largely unknown woman is Iris Rivera, who forwarded the cause of women in business. A legal secretary in the Illinois Appellate Court system, Rivera refused an order to make coffee for her male lawyer boss. Making coffee was not part of her job, she asserted, and she was fired. Following negotiations, changes were enacted. Iris’s sister secretaries provided in-service meetings for the male lawyers on how to make coffee in the office and how to use coffee vending machines. The end result? Rivera got her job back, and her former boss was reassigned – to a downstate post. Rivera is honored with the stop usually called Clark and Lake (Streets).

Volk’s research was done online, finding that “one woman led to another.” She followed up on the Chicago Park District’s project to rename many of its parks for extraordinary women. Online resources were available at the Newberry Library, the Chicago Public Library, the Chicago History Museum, and Chicago Tribune archives.

She intentionally made an effort to show diversity in her selections, which meant she reached out to scholars, particularly those studying Latinx women who are lesser known. She talked to local community organizers and found a professor at DePaul who was an expert in Chicago Latina history.

Volk says she has lots of “queens” on map: Queens of Funk, Gospel, Juke Boxes, the Blues, and International Polka. Website visitors can “Meet the Women” and learn a bit about each of the Women’s L Project honorees. Included are Frances Glessner Lee, the “Mother of Forensic Science”. Hazel Johnson, the “Mother of Environmental Justice,” advocated for cleaning up landfills in her neighborhood that had been proven to cause above-average cases of cancer. Lee’s station is the traditional McCormick Place on the Green Line; The last station on the south run of the Red Line at 95^th Street, carries Johnson’s name.

Volk wanted to include women who are still alive. Among those is Jeanne Gang, world famous architect, whose stop on the Brown Line is near the iconic boathouses she designed along the Chicago River. Another architect is Marion Mahoney Griffin, no longer living, but honored with the name of the next-to-last stop on the Green Line – close to her Oak Park work location.

A retired pastor, Volk is committed to giving back to the community. She is currently selling posters and journals featuring the Chicago Women’s L Project map on their covers. Ten percent of sales will be donated to various Chicago area non-profits serving women and children. The current recipient of the project’s Giving Back program is Mujeres Latinas en Acción, a Southwest Side non-profit founded by Maria Mangual, one of the Women L Project honorees, that empowers survivors of violence to heal, thrive, and become leaders.

“The project started small; now it has taken on a life of its own,” Volk says.

One woman who resonates with Volk is Angie Nevado Rizzo, whose station has been known as Belmont. She was involved with the Young Lords, a gang that became a political and human rights movement, the Young Lords Organization, working with Puerto Ricans who lived in the Lincoln Park and were being forced out of their neighborhood under the rubric of Urban Renewal. When the Young Lords’ leader went to jail, Angie took over to keep the organization running.

Cathy Adorno-Centeno, Angie’s daughter, spoke with Volk about the inclusion of her mother Angie, (Belmont Red/Brown/Purple line stop) in the Women’s L Project. Overwhelmed with emotion, she said, “Thank you for your interest in my mom. I hope someone else sees the hero that I loved dearly.”

That’s what the Women’s L Project is all about. For more about the Women’s L Project, CLICK HERE

_____________________________________________________________________

CLICK HERE for more stories on The Bridge.