THE VFA PIONEER HISTORIES PROJECT

Merrillee Ann Dolan

October 15, 1941 – November 5, 2014

“I’d been seething over things I’d experienced because of my sex: job discrimination, limited career choices, a date rape, and pressure to get married. I’d gone to Júarez for an abortion, illegal in the United States. I’d been scolded by a Catholic doctor when I asked for birth control pills, and I’d sat through a lecture by sexist lawyer F. Lee Bailey mocking rape victims. So in 1967, while in grad school at the University of Nevada in Reno, I joined NOW.” – Merrilee Dolan

Author, Activist, Educator. Albuquerque NOW. NOW National Board. Betty Friedan later appointed Merrillee to the Women and Poverty Task Force. Started a “Sisters in Poverty” newsletter to give guidance on forming coalitions with women on welfare and lobbied the chief of police to get women on the force and the state penitentiary to get meaningful job training for women. Started the first women’s studies class at the University of New Mexico with four others in 1969.

Photo. Merrillee Dolan, left, in 1971 with Catherine Albright, then president of the Albuquerque chapter of the National Organization for Women, reading an article titled, “NOW Claims Local Successes in Rights Struggle.” Printed in No More Fun and Games, Albuquerque, New Mexico. September 17, 1971.