Highlights From The Turbulent 1960s Civil Rights Movement

Women’s Rights and Feminism take a step forward

While much of the civil rights activity of the 1960s was focused on race and sexuality, women’s rights didn’t go unnoticed. In 1966, Betty Friedan formed the National Organization for Women (N.O.W.). The organization was originally designed to advance women’s rights in a slow, measured fashion but by the end of the decade – the new members had other ideas.

They protested the Miss America Pageant of 1968 and then began to define and dispose of “objects of female torture.” Bras may have been the most famous of these objects but they also included kitchen utensils and copies of the Ladies Home Journal.