Shulamith Koenig

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Overview

Shulamith Koenig born Jerusalem June 20, 1930. Human Rights activist; industrial engineer; co-founded Peace Now Tel Aviv in 1960s; founded People’s Movement for Human Rights Education (PDHRE) 1988; UN Human rights award 2003.

Quotations

“[A]ll people in all villages, towns, and cities around the world must know human rights as a way of life. We believe that all people really KNOW human Rights and spontaneously move away from humiliation. If this is true we must take the responsibility for moving this knowledge from the dormant stage to the power of knowledge. . . We call this LEARNING!” (Counter Currents, March 7, 2010; photo ssfupdates.blog)

Esther Loeb Kohn

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Overview

Esther Loeb Kohn born Chicago, IL January 12, 1875 (d. 1965). American social reformer. 30-year resident of Hull House, which she managed in Jane Addams's absence. Active in Russian famine relief, 1919. Pacifist delegate to WILPF Conference, Vienna, 1921. Made trip to Russia to contact pacifist women. Active in rescuing refugees from Nazi Germany; opposed peacetime draft after WWII; against rearming Europe, 1949. (photo flickr.com)

Eva Kollisch

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Overview

Eva Kollisch born Vienna, Austria August 17, 1925. American poet and professor of comparative literature. Feminist lesbian peace activist; anti-Stalinist Marxist Trotskyite. Escaped Germany in Childrens’ Transport, 1940. Arrested for anti-Vietnam protests. Took part in Seneca Peace demo; Women in Black vigiler. Received Clara Lemlich Award for Social Activism, 2016.

Quotations

“Not our sons, not your sons, not their sons.” (antiwar sign in vigil, Greenwich Village, Kate Wigand interview, Feb. 2004, Smith College Oral History, p. 24)

“I, as a pacifist, abhor that war [in Palestine], and I abhor suicide bombings, of course, and military action and the destruction of people’s homes—it’s all a nightmare, and I always think, there’s got to be another way.” (Ibid., p.40; photo Hamiltonstone.org)

Alexandra Kollontai

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Overview

Alexandra Kollontai born St. Petersburg, Russia March 31, 1872 (d. 1952). Soviet diplomat. Credited with ending war with Finland, 1940; opposed World War I.

Quotations

"If they’d just said we’re not going off to be killed or to kill other people like us there wouldn’t have been a war at all." (Love of Worker Bees, p. 21; photo Wikipedia)

Kathe Kollwitz

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Overview

Käthe Kollwitz (née Schmidt) born Königsberg, E. Prussia July 8, 1867 (d. 1945). “Mother of Expressionist Artists.” German anti-war artist.

Quotations

On the death of young soldiers like her son Peter: “Seed Corn Must Not Be Ground.”

“Every war already carries within it the war that will answer it.” (1944, diary, Wikiquote; photo Wikipedia)

Margaret Konantz

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Overview

Margaret Konantz (née Rogers) born Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada April 30, 1899 (d. 1967). Canadian internationalist politician. As delegate to UN General Assembly Third Committee on Social Affairs, worked on resolution against racism, 1963; UN Assembly, 1965. Liberal member of Parliament, 1963-65. Chair of UNICEF Canada, 1965-67.

Quotations

On rejecting the Cold War: “I chose an organization working for peace, rather than preparing for war.” (1956, in Colin McCullough, Canada and the UN; photo wpgtdn.org)

Erato Kozakou-Marcoullis

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Overview

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Erato Kozakou-Marcoullis born Limossol, Cyprus August 3, 1949. First woman Foreign Minister of Cyprus 2007; poet; sociologist; delegate to UN active in securing independence of Namibia.

Quotations

"The process of European integration is by its nature a peace process." (St. Louis, March 19, 2001; photo cemea.economistconferences.com)

Clementine Kraemer

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Overview

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Clementine Kraemer (née Cahnmann) born Rheinbischofsheim, Baden, Germany October 7, 1873 (d. 1942). Leading German pacifist writer; popular novelist and poet. Unable to find refuge abroad, she died at Theresienstadt concentration camp.

Quotations

"The most famous Jewish pacifist was Jesus of Nazareth." (Sholem Aleichem, Elizabeth Loentz, Women in German Yearbook, 2007, p.137; photo gedenkbuch neu-isenberg)

Marian Kramer

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Overview

Marian Kramer born Baton Rouge, LA June 16, 1944. Civil rights leader; co-chair National Welfare Rights Union; CORE staff in 1960s; arrested for NOW civil rights protests; Black women delegate to Beijing conference; delegate Seventh Pan African Congress Uganda 1994; arrest for Detroit water as human right protest 2014.

Quotations

“The true crime is that thousands of people who are struggling to pay their bills are being deprived of a necessity of life.” (Grand Rapids Legal News, Nov. 20, 2015; photo speakersfor anewamerica.com)

Martina Gezina Kramers

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Overview

Martina Gezina Kramers born Veur, Holland June 24, 1863 (d. 1935). Dutch internationalist, feminist, social democrat; spoke 12 languages; founded International Correspondence which got attention to women's issues in League of Nations and ILO.

Quotations

"Due to sustained pressure by feminist lobbyists at the end of the war, the political leaders who negotiated the Treaty of Versailles did include a provision on behalf of equal pay for equal work, and the treaty made specific provision for the inclusion of women in the work of the International Labour Organization and the League of Nations. But it was one thing to put the words into a treaty and another thing to make them a reality—as we know all too well today. Equal pay for equal work is no April Fool’s joke but an essential requirement en route to gender equity." (early 1918, in Karen Offen, International Museum of Women, April 2010; photo iisg.nl)

Hertha Kraus

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Overview

Hertha Kraus born Prague, Bohemia, Germany September 11, 1897 (d. 1968). German Jewish professor of social welfare; Quaker pacifist; early member of German FOR; exiled 1933.

Quotations

"[Nazi] Social policy has been given a clearly defined task. . .  [T]o achieve the ends which are fixed for the nation by National Socialism: developing the resources of the nation in line with totalitarian population and manpower policy; it does not recognize the humanitarian ideal of the preservation of human values nor the integrity of each individual being." ("Social Services in Nazi Germany." Cornell Law School, p. 4, 1944; photo sbk-koeln.de)

Allison Krause

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Overview

Allison Krause born Pittsburgh, PA April 23, 1951 (d. 1970). 19-year-old Kent State University freshman killed by Ohio National Guard in protest against Cambodian invasion, 1970.

Quotations

Her reply when soldier rejected the lilac she put in his gun barrel: "What's the matter with peace? Flowers are better than bullets!" (http://may4archive.org/allison_krause)

Poem by Yevtuschenko: "[Y]ou put a flower in a rifle's mouth and said, 'Flowers are better than bullets.'" (translation by Anthony Kahn, Pravda, 1970)

Betty Krawczyk

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Overview

Betty Shiver Krawczyk born Salinas, CA August 4, 1928. Canadian environmental activist; repeatedly arrested, jailed 1994, 1999, 2000 (twice), 2002, 2004, 2006, 2007 for nonviolent environmental protests.

Quotations

“When citizens are willing to take the responsibility of civil disobedience, civil disobedience evolves into the body of law. Instead of civil disobedience threatening the structure of law, it actually strengthens it.” (Cathedral Grove: A brave stand: Betty!; photo amazon.com)

Joan Kroc

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Overview

Joan Kroc (née Mansfield) born St. Paul, MN August 27, 1928 (d. 2003). Musician; benefactor of Peace Studies programs Notre Dame 1987, San Diego 2000.

Quotations

"I really appreciate what you’re trying to do to prevent nuclear war, and I really believe in that and I’m going to help you." (to Father Hesburgh, April 1987)

"This is a place not just to talk about peace, but to make peace." (dedication of Institute for Peace & Justice, 2000; photo NNDB)

Anne Krueger

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Overview

Anne Olive Krueger born Endicott, NY February 12, 1934. Chief Economist of World Bank, 1982-86; acting head of International Monetary Fund, 2004.

Quotations

"Helping to reduce poverty is a challenge for which we should all feel some responsibility. It is unequivocally desirable. And it is achievable. Ulysses was right: there is a newer, better world to find." (School of Advanced Int. Study [SAIS], May 9, 2005; 2004 photo IMF)