THE VFA PIONEER HISTORIES PROJECT
Madeline Schwenk
May 12, 1941 – December 11, 2013
“I counsel people who are getting abortions. It’s not legal, but it’s safe and we do a good thing.”
Women’s reproductive rights advocate. Original member of Jane: The Abortion Counseling Service. Chicago NOW. Illinois Citizens for the Medical Control of Abortion. Chaired the Chicago NOW Abortion Rights committee.
Photo. Formed in 1965, Jane was an underground network in Chicago that counseled and helped women who wanted to have abortions. From left: Martha Scott, Jeanne Galatzer-Levy, Abby Pariser, Sheila Smith and Madeline Schwenk were among the seven members of Jane arrested in 1972 (Courtesy of Martha Scott).
Madeline Schwenk sorting mail at NOW headquarters, Chicago, 1970.
More About Madeline:
- “Code Names and Secret Lives: How a Radical Underground Network Helped Women Get Abortions Before They Were Legal,” by Clara Bingham, Vanity Fair, April 17, 2019
- “Chicago’s Forgotten Pro-Choice Warriors,” by Marcia Froelke Coburn, Chicago Magazine, March 19, 2019
- “The Janes,” HBO documentary
- “Jane: An Abortion Service,” Produced and Directed by Kate Kirtz and Nell Lundy, 1995
- “Abortion: The Issue Still Burns,” Chicago Tribune, January 1978
- National Organization for Women, Chicago Chapter Records, Special Collections and University Archives, University of Illinois at Chicago
- The Jane Collective on Wikipedia