Discover DC Sheroes

If you live in or near Washington, DC, you NEED to know about TOHO: A Tour of Her Own. Check out all the tour options from awesome founder Kaitlin Calogera and her guide crew.

And if you ever spend time in DC, you got to get their book, 111 Places in Women’s History That You Must Not Miss, full of diverse treasures ranging from gardens to herstoric homes to murals and more that inspire us all.

Now that I’ve moved near DC in Silver Spring, Maryland, I can finally visit the fascinating sites in this book. Woohoo! Looking forward to seeing all the rest of the women-celebrating sites on various DC forays to come.

That’s me under the arrow, ready to SING!

I recently dipped into the offerings, piggybacking a few stops onto my jaunt to DC to sing with Rapid Response Choir for the epic May Day protest.

After singing, I was exhilarated to join with the thousands who marched and chanted and sang to make it clear that our country can and should be much better for all our people who daily make our country better.

May Day marchers filled the boulevards of downtown DC with energy for change.

After the march, I used the book’s handy DC Herstory map to find nearby herstory sites. Coincidentally with my musical protest day, the shero sites near me had musical links. First stop: Flora Molton’s call box at G and 13th NW.

Flora’s is one of several old callboxes that for a century served as a kind of 911 with a switch passersby could flip in the event of fire or other emergency. The city-commissioned series commemorates overlooked women, including the DC union organizer and community activist Josephine Butler and Alice Stokes Paul, who in 1913 led thousands of suffragists past her callbox at 14th and Pennsylvania while they were jeered and assaulted.

Gifted guitarist Flora Molton played blues and gospel at her callbox corner for decades, earning tips tossed into the plastic bucket attached to her guitar. Partially blind and musically self-educated, this incredible musician only gained some due later in life, recording her first album at 79.

Flora Molton playing at her corner—note the original callbox in the background.

Her street concerts weren’t always welcome in segregated DC, where the police would chase her away early on. But she persisted, and began to be noticed and encouraged by others in the blues and folk scene. Later, she started her own recording company, Molton Records, and played at the Smithsonian Folklife Festival and went on a tour to Europe.

Linger and listen to her play at her favorite corner, where folks were lucky to hear her as they passed by or headed into the Woodward & Lothrop department store.

Flora Molton on left and Esther Mae Prentiss Scott in center

By the way, Flora is joined by other overlooked female blues guitarists in DC and beyond. Esther Mae Prentiss “Mother” Scott, born on a Mississippi plantation to formerly enslaved parents, played often at St. Stephen and the Incarnation Episcopal Church (still supportive of all!) in DC’s Mt. Pleasant neighborhood. Esther Mae also played DC clubs such as the Childe Harold, Cedar Door, and others. She also gained some fame in later life, cutting her first record at age 78. Here are Flora and Mother playing together; listen in to Esther Mae’s Mama Ain’t Nobody’s Fool.

Next to Flora’s callbox is one for artist and educator Alma Woodsey Thomas, who devoted decades to teaching art at the segregated Shaw Junior High School near Howard University while she created beautiful abstract work in her time off. Alma was inspired in part by the luscious gowns made by her mother Amelia, a dressmaker.

In the 1930s, she helped start one of the country’s first galleries for Black artists, the Barnett-Aden Gallery.

Her first abstract show took place at Howard University in 1966, when she was 75 years old. Check out her beautiful work at the nearby National Museum of Women in the Arts. Alma’s “Resurrection” hopefully still hangs in the White House, where it was installed by Michele Obama in 2016.

Love how each stop in the 111 herstory book also has a “Tip” about another nearby herstory treat! Flora’s stop directs you one block away to the callbox for Mary Church Terrell, who spent a lifetime pushing civil rights forward.

Just one powerful example: Mary founded national groups and local ones including the Coordinating Committee for the Enforcement of the D.C. Anti-Discrimination Laws.

Look around and give thanks to all who dismantled Jim Crow.

She led lunch counter sit-ins in the 1950s at Thompson’s Restaurant and Murphy’s Five and Dime, both near her callbox. These actions and a lawsuit led to a Supreme Court ruling that dealt a blow to Jim Crow cruelty. Read more at tours created by the awesome DC Preservation League.

Next I checked the book and walked to G and 13th NW to the Warner Theatre. Imagine all the musical joy that has resounded inside the beautiful performance palace since 1924!

I searched their stars in the sidewalk. I paid homage at a couple of my musical sheroes and hummed a few songs in tribute.

I stopped at the star for Sweet Honey in the Rock, the awesome activist a cappella group founded in 1973 by Bernice Johnson Reagon and continues today in their beautifully harmonic work for Black women and more. The group’s mission remains to “educate, entertain, and empower.” They’ve done it beautifully with songs that urge us to take action on issues such as poverty, gun violence, government repression around the world, and more as we sing together in joy.

Bernice (sitting center) and Sweet Honey in the Rock

I hummed Ella’s Song, which Bernice wrote from the words of civil rights shero Ella Baker. Learn more about Ella, an incredible force for civil rights who believed in the power of people, at the Ella Baker Center for Human Rights.

Next I stopped at Bonnie Raitt’s star, with its “No Nukes” message left in cement by her. This incredible guitarist has generously supported causes such as environmentalism and human rights for her entire continuing career.

I first saw Bonnie at a Denver No Nukes concert, and had her albums on repeat in my twenties with her rockin’ the old blues such as Sweet Home Kokomo. I sang a bit of it at her Warner star 50 years after. Among her many original songs, I appreciate Livin’ For the Ones, which asks us to honor those left behind by opportunity by living fully in community.

I bopped north a few blocks to an intriguing spot I’d seen in the book, and the Hotel Zena delivered in spades! It’s fitting that Hotel Zena opened in 2020 as a female empowerment site in a year marking the 100th anniversary of women’s suffrage.

Stepping in, you’re instantly bathed in striking art that celebrates struggle, empowerment, and hope. A centerpiece is this portrait of Ruth Bader Ginsburg, the Supreme Court Justice who spent her legal career advancing female equality. Look closer. RBG was created by arranging 20,000 hand-painted tampons!

While contemplating The Notorious RBG, I hummed this anthem I sang a few years back with the Resistance Choir, a song lauding her and hoping that she would survive to keep doing her important work, Hang on, Ruthie.

Browse all the lobby art to meet sheroes from around the world, from Sampat Pal Devi, founder of the Gulabi Gang, vigilante women in India’s Uttar Pradesh state who fights domestic abuse and sexual predation, to Shirley Anita Chisholm, first African American woman elected to Congress.

Don’t miss the Wall of Honor, which honors over 200 more righteous women—and some men who support equality. Just a few spanning recorded time: from Egyptian pharaoh Hatshepsut to civil rights shero Pauli Murray to feminist activists working worldwide now such as Honduran changemaker Daysi Flores. See the name guide to this mighty crowd here.

When you leave, look up at the wall and relish the warrior/sentinel women murals by DC-based artist Miss Chelove, titled Guardians of the Four Directions. Those who stay and do business at the hotel can see more of her warrior women, such as a stunning boardroom mural.

And check out the amazing rooftop view of DC at their bar, Hedy’s Rooftop. The spot honors Hedy Lamarr, film star and producer who ALSO invented frequency hopping, an innovation that led to Bluetooth, Wifi, and GPS technology. Learn more in the PBS documentary Bombshell.

Can’t wait to explore more DC herstory from the book and TOHO!

Women Around the World Who ROCK