THE VFA PIONEER HISTORIES PROJECT

Lorraine Rothman

January 12, 1932 – September 25, 2007

“What did women do before there were doctors? Let’s stop the humiliation of trying to persuade the powers that be to legalize abortion. Let’s just take back the technology, the tools, the skills and the information to perform early abortions and be in charge of our own reproduction.”

Author and activist. A pioneer of the Self-Help Movement. Founding member of the Self-Help Clinic One, 1971. Applied for and received a U.S. patent for the Del-Em menstrual extraction kit to make abortions available to women before Roe v. Wade, 1971. Co-founded the first Feminist Women’s Health Center (FWHC) in California.

Photo. LIFE Magazine Special Report, “Remarkable Women: 1776-1976.” L-R: Suzann Gage, Sherry Shiffer, Francie Hornstein, Carol Downer, Lorraine Rothman and Lynn Heidelberg (lying-down), 1976.