Girl Power, in the Age of a Female Commander in Chief

Letter to my nearly 2-yr-old daughter, on the eve of Hillary’s assent to the White House

By Jacob Wheeler
Sun editor

Dear Nina Louisa,

It’s been a big couple weeks in your household. Last Thursday morning, you awoke to the news that your Chicago Cubs — the team assigned to you through geography and paternal tradition — had won their first World Series championship in 108 years. And this coming Wednesday morning, we believe — and hope — you’ll wake to the news that a woman has won the presidential election for the first time in United States history.

That woman, Hillary Clinton (you have a favorite doll of her namesake) will become the leader of this country — and perhaps the most important leader in the world — in just over two months. When she takes the oath of office in a lavish ceremony in front of the U.S. Capitol in Washington, D.C., on Jan. 20, with hundreds of thousands of well-wishers watching from the National Mall (and protestors, too), she’ll follow in the footsteps of 44 previous Presidents — all of whom were men.

This world-changing event — a woman confidently and competently doing what many men before her have done — is a bold, radical, and revolutionary act (those are positive words in our household). It’s an act that makes some entitled men jealous and angry, because they fear they’ll lose their grip on power — the power they alone have clenched for millennia. These men include Hillary’s opponent in the race for president, a single-minded and vulgar man who loves nothing more than his own power, and to behold his reflection in the mirror. He is a tyrant, drunk on vanity and hubris, and he hates women who do not submit to him in totality. His election campaign made us nauseous and angry, and we learned along the way that he is dangerously insecure about his masculinity and about his ability to lead, he hates people of different religions, skin colors, and people from across the southern border. And he hates women, whom he admitted — even bragged — about sexually assaulting. As vile as his presence has been, Hillary’s ultimate victory over this scariest-of-all-villains seemed somehow appropriate. She’ll slay the fiercest dragon last. … It was of great relief to us that this grotesque man did not win the right to the great honor — and even greater responsibility — of serving as President of the United States. No, the time has come, at last, for a woman — your fine and deserving gender — to take the helm and lead us.

I write this letter to you, Nina, not merely to announce the eve of a great victory, not merely to predict where you will be (sleeping soundly in your crib, no doubt) when a strong and intelligent and experienced and articulate woman wins America’s highest honor. I write this letter to you as a vehicle that will allow us to travel back in time and meet the strong women in your family — your blood lineage — who dared to break the rules that were established and enforced by men. Each, by crossing the threshold of a male-dominated society, helped to pave the way for the first female President of the United States.

Sure, when you go to school in a few years and open American history books, you’ll learn about Elizabeth Cady Stanton and the women’s suffrage movement which won the right to vote; you’ll understand how Gloria Steinem and mid-20th century feminists broke down stereotypes; you’ll weep when you read about Harriet Tubman, who taught black slaves to escape their masters’ whips and follow Polaris, the north star, to freedom along the “underground railroad”, or Rosa Parks who refused to give up her bus seat to a white passenger; you’ll take to the streets when you read about Dolores Huerta, labor leader and co-founder of the National Farmworkers Association; you’ll smile when you’re taught how a lesbian couple, April DeBoer and Jayne Rowse, lead the legal fight in Michigan for the right of gays to marry whom they love. These strong, daring and remarkable women all opened the door for Hillary Clinton. …

But do you know about Marie Moon, your great-great maternal grandmother, who did the unthinkable for a woman from northern Michigan in the 1910s? She left her young son with a sibling and went to New York City to study at Columbia University (as the soldiers marched in nearby Central Park to the music of John Philip Sousa before going off to France to fight in the trenches). Marie came home to Traverse City and became the head dietitian at the State Hospital, where the “inmates” raised their own cattle and farmed their own food. Did you know that your great-great paternal grandmother, Mimi Schauman Jensen, had the courage to leave an unhappy marriage at a time when divorce was nearly unheard of in rural, provincial Denmark?

Did you know that Mimi Shauman’s daughter, Marie Louise, your great-grandmother, fell in love with, and married Peter during the dark days of the Nazi occupation of Copenhagen? When Marie Louise came home to Jutland and found that German soldiers paid frequent visits to her mother’s home to hear Bach and Beethoven on the piano, she openly spat in a Wehrmacht officer’s boots. Her moral compass was wound so tight that she worried not about the danger she put herself in. Nina, your middle name comes from her. Did you know that your other paternal grand-grandmother, Anna Jean Wheeler, came from a poor family from rural Oceana County, Michigan, and she worked third-shift hours in the canning factory, and saved every cent so that her son (your farfar Norm) had money to go to college.

You are lucky to know one great grandmother, Clara Moon, who is 98 years old and still as joyful and optimistic as the forest in the springtime. You met her when you were but 7 days old, Nina. Clara has worked hard and seen much in her lifetime. The orchards and farmland on her Old Mission Peninsula have largely given way to wineries and expensive homes, and her late husband Bill has been gone for many years, but she continues to smile and watch the seasons pass with the diligence of a lighthouse. Clara’s daughter, Sally, your “grandma” whom you know well, navigated the rocky shoals of growing up the only girl in a traditional household surrounded by boys. She wasn’t permitted to wear blue jeans or taught to drive a car before going to college. But given her chance, Sally turned the other cheek. She fell in love with education, and devoted her professional life to teaching elementary-aged children — often underprivileged kids from rural Benzie County. She designed innovative curriculums that both embraced and challenged them, despite little support from her superiors.

Did you know that your farmor, Mimi, left her provincial, male-dominated home and set out for Copenhagen in the ‘70s. There she helped establish a utopian hippy commune that questioned the rules of the Danish government and the European Union. She met and married an American backpacker, and took the courageous step of moving across the ocean with him, to a land she didn’t know. This was long before the continents were connected by cheap telecommunication and Skype. When I think of these stories, Nina, I am astounded at the bravery and the steadfastness of the women who have come before you.

Now, to be sure, not all of the women in your family tree would have voted for Hillary Clinton, and that’s not my point. Many of them are deeply conservative and have built an honorable allegiance, over many decades, with the Republican Party, which opposes Hillary. Nevertheless, I would opine that even their bold steps, and willingness to break the lines unfairly drawn by men, have brought us to this epoch — this great leap toward the eventual goal of gender equality.

And, of course, your mother, Sarah. She’s bold and driven and kind. She’s also strong-willed and feisty and opinionated, which are all good things (you have Sicilian blood in your family, my dear). Your mother has used her public health expertise to help undocumented immigrant teenage mothers in Grand Rapids, resettled refugees in Chicago, and food insecure people here in northern Michigan. But her biggest feat? You were present for your own birth, of course. But did you know that she labored for many hours — even with you in the birth canal on the verge of being born — without taking any drugs? Since you entered the world nearly two years ago, she has nursed you, made meals, maintained a tidy household, put up with my stubborn self, and worked a full-time job where she continues to help others.

These are the inspiring strong women who came before you, Nina. Let’s honor them for helping to pry open doors — even the door to the White House.

– Jacob Wheeler, “Dada”
November 8, 2016