Home and Shopping
100 Pairs of Shoes: Walk This Way Exhibition Includes Stories of Conformity, Independence, Culture, Class, Politics and Performance
In the early 1900s, when women made up less than 20 percent of the total industrial workforce, one-third of the workers in shoe factories were women. Women became active in trade unions like the Daughters of St. Crispin, named after the patron saint of shoemakers, and the International Boot & Shoe Workers Union, participating in strikes to protest low wages and poor treatment. Considered radical for its time, by 1904 the Boot & Shoe Workers Union constitution called for “uniform wages for the same class of work, regardless of sex.” An intricately beaded shoe (c. 1915), stamped with the union seal, shows off the quality of American shoemaking. more »
National Institutes of Health: Mediterranean Diet May Slow Development of Alzheimer’s Disease, Recipes by Lisa Mosconi
In a new study, Dr. Lisa Mosconi from Weill Cornell Medicine and her colleagues measured changes in brains over time. They performed baseline brain imaging in 34 people who ate a Mediterranean diet and 36 people who ate a Western diet. The volunteers ranged in age from 30 to 60 and showed no symptoms of dementia when the study began. The researchers then repeated the scans at least two years later. The study was supported by NIH’s National Institute on Aging (NIA). Results were published online in Neurology on April 13, 2018. more »
Little Women, Masterpiece Theater: "I detest rude, unladylike girls!" "I hate affected, niminy-piminy chits!" "Birds in their little nests agree," sang Beth, the peacemaker
She is buried in Sleepy Hollow Cemetery in Concord, near Emerson, Hawthorne, and Thoreau, on a hillside now known as "Authors' Ridge". Her Boston home is featured on the Boston Women's Heritage Trail. Her childhood home Orchard House is now a museum that pays homage to Louisa May Alcott and her family that focuses on education. In addition, Harriet Reisen wrote Louisa May Alcott: The Woman Behind "Little Women" which later became a film that was directed by Nancy Porter and aired on PBS television. more »
Stateline: Why Most States Are Struggling to Regulate Airbnb
About 15 states debated bills to regulate the short-term rental industry this year. Only one, Indiana’s, was signed into law. Nebraska’s governor vetoed a bill approved by that state’s Legislature. A bill to regulate the industry also died in Hawaii. Home-owners and hotels have different business models, different perspectives and different agendas. These competing constituencies help account for the difficulty states have had in regulating and taxing the short-term rental industry, even as some cities have taken action to regulate short-term rentals. more »
