THE VFA PIONEER HISTORIES PROJECT
Liz Carpenter
September 1, 1920 – March 20, 2010
“This is not a feminist issue; it is a simple extension of civil rights to the largest group left out when the Constitution was drawn in 1787.” – Liz Carpenter’s statement about a Stop ERA rally, Austin, TX, April 1977
Writer, reporter, media advisor, speechwriter, political humorist, and public relations expert. The first woman executive assistant to Vice President Lyndon Baines Johnson from 1961 to 1963, and then as press secretary for First Lady, Lady Bird Johnson from 1963 to 1969. A founder of the National Women’s Political Caucus and joint chairwoman of ERAmerica.
Photo. ERAmerica Team (left to right): Ellen Boddie, Marie Bass, Kathleen Currie, Honorary Co-Chairs Liz Carpenter and Elly Peterson, Maureen Shay, Roz Baker, David Abrams, Sheila Greenwald, Betsy Crone.
More About Liz:
- Obituary, The New York Times
- Shaking it Up: The Life & Times of Liz Carpenter
- “When the Nineteenth Amendment was Born So Was My Feminist Mom,” by Christy Carpenter
- Appearances on C-SPAN
- Texas Archive of the Moving Image
- The Liz Carpenter Award, given annually for the best scholarly book on the history of women and Texas published during the calendar year.
- Wikipedia page
- Cited in Barbara Love’s book, Feminists Who Changed America 1963-1975, page 74