Tonight will make it official. One particularly high and resilient glass ceiling will be shattered when delegates at the Democratic Convention officially nominate Hillary Rodham Clinton to be the party’s presidential nominee. Too bad that Geraldine Ferraro did not live to see this day. Thirty-two years earlier on July 19, 1984, she became the first woman to claim a spot at the top of the Democratic ticket as the Vice Presidential nominee. I was there to see it happen.
 
I was working as a freelance journalist in San Francisco. By 1984 the political and medical challenges of AIDS demanded most of my writing time, but the chance to be on the convention floor was something I couldn’t resist. I’d like to write that I was on assignment, but instead a colleague needed someone to schlep his bulky, heavy videocam equipment. My writing partner at the time, Rick Osmon, and I agreed.
 
We had played out scenarios – like many Americans at the time – about which woman might be selected during the extended VP vetting routine. Presidential nominee Walter “Fritz” Mondale interviewed a clutch of mayors, senators, and governors. San Francisco Mayor Dianne Feinstein was prominent enough among the finalists to share a TIME magazine cover with New York congresswoman Geraldine Ferraro. Speaker of the US House of Representatives Tip O’Neill encouraged Mondale to select Ferraro, a three-term member of Congress representing Queens.
 
On July 19 Rick Osmon and I maneuvered through the exuberant delegates packing the Moscone Center. New York Governor Mario Cuomo fired up the crowd, similar to Senator Cory Booker’s rousing address last night. Other observers have described a “sea of women on the convention floor.” Several women we talked with said male delegates had yielded their floor passes so women colleagues could witness the historic moment when for the first time a woman joined a national ticket.

Last night I was privileged to speak at the Mechanics Institute Library in San Francisco, the city’s oldest continuous library that was founded in 1854. In recognition of the tragic events that happened the next day 100 years ago, on July 22, 1916, I read excerpts from my biography of Marie Equi about the controversial War Preparedness Parades prior to the US entry into World War I. Here’s the segment:
 
A Troubling, Contentious Year
“Across the country 1916 was a troubling, contentious year fraught with foreboding and disruption. Americans felt uncertain and unsteady as the hostilities in Europe worsened and threatened the nation’s tenuous neutrality. Strikes flared east to west with picketing shoe workers in Philadelphia, steel workers in Detroit, housemaids in Denver, and loggers in Washington. It was a presidential election year with war and peace, woman suffrage, and labor rights dominating the political campaigns.
 
“Much of America accepted the message of war preparedness as necessary self-defense even if they objected to a foreign military adventure. For a full two-and-a-half years, Americans resisted the pull of war and took comfort in their distance from the changing, dangerous world beyond the country’s shores. At the same time, war boosters enthralled young men with visions of the glory that awaited them in the fields of France, far from their grinding factory jobs or farm work. Progressives feared that reform efforts at home would be scuttled by a government preoccupied with war and by a population consumed with nationalism. In this jumble of sentiments, a significant minority suspected “readiness” was a capitalist ploy that would inevitably lead to war with a grab for power and profits.
 
Preparedness – A National Watchword
“Preparedness became a nation watchword, and its spirit unified most Americans in the camaraderie of shared purpose. Throughout the summer of 1916, nearly every city and town outdid itself with a parade. In Chicago one million people rallied, waving flags and signing patriotic songs in an eleven-hour procession. New York City’s outpouring drew two hundred bands and fifty drum corps.
 
Bomb Disrupts San Francisco Parade
“Violence marred San Francisco’s parade, and its impact shadowed labor and civil rights for decades. On July 22, 1916, fifty-one thousand marchers assembled at the foot of Market Street around the Ferry Building. Thirty minutes into the parade, a bomb exploded with a force so great that it tore off legs and arms of bystanders, killing ten and injuring forty. No one knew who had placed the bomb, but the police arrested Tom Mooney, a radical Socialist and union leader, as well as Warren K. Billings, among others, who they suspected of promoting violence for political change. The proceedings against Mooney and Billings were scandalous from the start. Mooney was denied legal counsel for days. Evidence was specious; the witness, unreliable. Murder charges were drawn up by a jury selected by the district attorney, and a conviction followed. Only an international outcry kept Mooney from execution. He and Billings were left to languish at San Quentin State Prison with life sentences. They were not released until 1934.”
 
“Marie Equi: Radical Politics and Outlaw Passions,” by Michael Helquist, published by Oregon State University Press, 2016. Available at bookstores and online sites.

San Francisco’s venerable Mechanics' Institute Library, located at 57 Post Street in the Financial District, will host a reading, slide program, and discussion with author Michael Helquist about his new biography, Marie Equi, Radical Politics and Outlaw Passions. The event is scheduled for Thursday, July 21, at 6pm. Members and public welcome.
 
Marie Equi was an early woman physician on the West Coast, a publicly known lesbian, and a fiercely independent activist unafraid to take risks or stand by her principles. She had many links with the Bay Area: including self-studying her way into a local medical school, pursuing post-graduate work, becoming a heroine of 1906 earthquake relief, and enduring imprisonment at San Quentin prison for protesting World War I.  
 
Helquist will also focus on the centennial of San Francisco’s 1916 Preparedness Day Parade in which 10 people were killed and scores wounded after an explosion disrupted the public gathering in support of readiness for World War I. The Mechanics Institute building on Post Street was completed ten years earlier and was situated near the parade route. The notorious incident became one of many witnessed by the 152-year-old organization.
 
In 1854 San Francisco’s population skyrocketed after the Gold Rush, and the city struggled with little infrastructure or support for its settlers. A small group of civic leaders gathered to organize a Mechanics' Institute, a skills and learning center for working people that was popular in Europe and other US cities. Boasting an expansive library, a chess room, and social space, the Mechanics' Institute Library foreshadowed by more than 100 years the transformation currently underway in US libraries to broaden learning services, skill-building opportunities, and to offer robust community interactions.
 
The nine-story Mechanics' Institute building now houses a vibrant library with more than 160,000 volumes, a world-renowned chess room, and an expansive events program. Members may participate free in all programs. Admission for visitors is $15. Free library and chess room tours are conducted every Wednesday at noon for new or prospective members.  
 
Link to Mechanics' Institute:  http://www.milibrary.org/