Frantiska Plaminkova

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Overview

Frantiŝka Plamínková born Prague, Czechoslovakia February 5, 1875 (d. 1942). Pioneering Czech feminist; teacher; WILPF member. Elected to Czech National Assembly as senator, 1925; delegate to League of Nations, 1931; jailed by Nazis, 1939, 1942; executed by firing squad without trial, 1942.

Quotations

"I am firmly convinced that the truth will, after all, prevail even against the military superiority." (Letter to Hitler, 1938, Czech Dialog, pp. 3-4, 2007; photo http://bit.ly/JgP8Uo)

Ursula Plassnik

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Overview

Ursula Plassnik born Klagenfurt, Austria May 23, 1956. Austrian Foreign Minister, 2004-08; European delegate to reform of UN Human Rights Committee. Led negotiations on Croatia and Turkey's admission to European Union; as President of European Assembly, brought all members back to unity talks, 2005.

Quotations

"The fight against terrorism must, therefore, be carried out with full respect for human rights and the rule of law." (June 19, 2006 speech to UN; photo Wikipedia)

Ardeth Platte

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Overview

Ardeth Platte born Westphalia, MI April 10, 1936. Nonviolent Dominican nun who led "loving" nonviolent protests against war, militarism and nuclear weapons, leading to closing Wurtsmith AFB and Roberts AFB. Member of Plowshares resistance; arrested multiple times, served 41 months in prison, 2002.

Quotations

"I refuse to be silent." (Sept. 16, 2011 testimony to federal court, Knoxville, TN; photo Mich. Women's Hall of Fame)

Caroline Playne

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Overview

Caroline Playne born Avening, Gloucestershire, England May 4, 1857 (d. 1948). Historian of war and peace. Anticipating WWI, co-founded National Peace Council, 1904. Authored paper “The Evolution of International Peace”, contrasting internationalism of Tolstoy, etc. with contemporary Social Darwinism. Attended International Peace Council, London, 1908. Opposed WWI, working with Relief of Distressed Enemy Aliens, Union for Democratic Control, Nailsworth Peace Association and National Peace Council. Banned from Hague Women's Peace Congress, 1915. After the war she published four books on the neurosis of war; also wrote biography of first woman Nobel Peace laureate, Bertha von Suttner.

Quotations

On the British rush to war: “And they felt, in their hearts, intense relief that there was to be no more negotiating, no more thinking, no more heeding, only rushing on, on, gloriously, splendidly on, all traces kicked over, all bridles thrown away!” (photo Senate House Library)

Marie Pleissner

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Overview

Marie Luise Pleissner born Chemnitz, Saxony, Germany May 19, 1891 (d. 1983). German Quaker war-resister; opposed WWI, joining “Never War Again”; early member International FOR; founded chapter of World Peace League of Mothers and Educators 1932; urged Quaker aid to Jews; fired as teacher 1934; arrested 1939; survived 8 months in Ravensbrück prison; postwar member of Saxony legislature; active in peace movement.

Quotations

“One cannot fall lower than into God’s hands.” (on release from prison, “Short biographies of German Quakers during the Nazi regime”; photo quaekernachrichten)

Olga Poblete

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Overview

Olga Poblete de Espinosa born Tacna, Chile May 21, 1908 (d. 1999). Chilean peace activist; professor of world history and education; feminist “founding matriarch” of Movement for Emancipation of Women (MEMCH); demonstrated against dictator Ibañez 1931; opposed nuclear weapons 1946; founded Chilean peace movement 1950; its president 1960; World Peace Council gold medal 1959; secretary World Peace Council for Latin America 1961; organized Latin-American Conference for National Sovereignty, Economic Emancipation, and Peace 1961; Lenin Peace Prize 1962; openly opposed Pinochet dictatorship 1973.

Quotations

“Work more with the heart than with the brain.” (cimacnoticias 2094; photo dedaldeoro.cl)

Hanna Poddig

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Overview

Hanna Poddig born Osterladekop, Jorg, Lower Saxony, Germany November 11, 1985. German anti-nuclear protester and “full-time activist.” Blocked uranium shipment Gronau, 2012; refused fine, jailed 110 days.

Quotations

“I believe in direct actions that interfere directly in the process. It's not about destructive measures, but to interrupt normality.” (May 3, 2017 Project A; photo gessnerallee.ch)

Maria Pognon

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Overview

Maria Pognon (née Rengnet) born Honfleur, France February 19, 1844 (d. 1925). French journalist; radical feminist, pacifist, and socialist. Co-founded International Union of Women for Peace, 1895; International Association of Journalist Friends of Peace, 1897. President, French League for Women (LFDF), 1893-1904.

Quotations

“[I]n the teaching of history educators ought to set forth the barbarity and injustice of wars and develop in their pupils an admiration of savants instead of great conquerors, violators of justice and right.” (International Women’s Congress, 1899, in Advocate of Peace, Nov. 1900, p. 218; photo parisenimges)

Laura Poitras

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Overview

Laura Poitras born Boston, MA February 2, 1964. Documentary filmmaker; Received International Human rights von Ossietzky award for revealing US war documents and spying, 2014. Directed films My Country, My Country on US occupation of Iraq, 2006; The Oath, about the war on terror, 2010.

Quotations

“When the most important decisions are made in secret, we lose our ability to check the powers that control.” (Feb. 23, 2015; photo hollywoodreporter.com)

Mona Polacca

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Overview

Mona Polacca born Arizona January 22, 1955. Hopi elder; Havasupai treasurer. Member of International Council of 13 Indigenous Grandmothers. Served on UN committees relating to indigenous people's issues.

Quotations

“Indigenous people have come through a time of great struggle, a time of darkness. . . We grandmothers, we have emerged from that darkness, see this beauty, see each other and reach out to the world with open arms, with love, hope, compassion, faith, and charity.” (quote & photo eomega.org)

Lydie Polfer

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Overview

Lydie Polfer born Luxembourg City, Luxembourg November 22, 1952. Luxembourg Foreign Minister, 1999-2004, during European expansion by nine new states, and European Charter.

Quotations

"The role and the fundamental objectives of the Council of Europe have never been called into question, and it continues to play an essential part in the process of European unification. Over the decades this organisation has carried on its work behind-the-scenes, patiently and persuasively consolidating the noble culture of human rights, democracy and the rule of law, while at the same time giving major social issues all the attention they deserve." (Nov. 7, 2002; photo 2007 cornishong wiki)

Anna Politkovskaya

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Overview

Anna Politkovskaya born New York City August 30, 1958 (assassinated 2006). Russian war correspondent exposed brutality and corruption of Chechen War; rejecting usual military heroes, her heroine was village head Malika who openly cursed the generals and officials.

Quotations

"What a dirty war this is!" (A Small Corner of Hell, p. 223, 2003; 2005 photo Wikipedia)

Josephine Wertheim Pomerance

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Overview

Josephine Wertheim Pomerance born Manhattan, NY October 25, 1910 (d. 1980). Leader of WILPF; co-founder of SANE, 1957; served on American Association for the UN, 1959; leader of Citizens Committee for a Nuclear Test Ban, 1962.

Quotations

"I thought it all right if a mother had to get up nights with measles or chicken pox, but to have to comfort her children because of fear of nuclear bombing was a little too much. . . It was time a mother did something." (New York Times, July 17, 1980)

Marie Popelin

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Overview

Marie Popelin born Schaerbeek, Brussels September 17, 1846 (d. 1913). First Belgian feminist; educator who founded Alliance of Women for Peace through Education 1898; first Belgian woman lawyer 1888; organized International Feminist Conference Brussels 1897.

Quotations

On the goal of her school: "To create, not a free woman, such as in the disordered imagination of some delirious clerics, but a liberated woman, honorably liberated, by work, by talent and by science." (Eliane Gubin, Dictionnaire des Femmes Belges, p. 461, 2006; photo nl.Wikipedia)

Zelda Popkin

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Overview

Zelda Popkin (née Feinberg) born Brooklyn, NY July 5, 1898 (d. 1983). Mystery writer who opposed war.

Quotations

"What he found impossible was to shut off his brain, to detach himself from the intriguing problems with which (he) was involved, or to leave alone the major problems of war and peace, race and poverty, man's inhumanity to man and the persistence of stupidity." (A Death of Innocence, 1971)

"Human kindness is immortal. It cannot die, for every gesture, every word which goes out of you becomes part of someone else." (Open Every Door, p. 358, 1956; photo gadetection.pbworks.com)

Adelheid Popp

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Overview

Adelheid Popp (née Dworschak) born Inzersdorf, Vienna, Austria February 11, 1869 (d. 1939). Austrian feminist; suffragist; journalist. Pacifist and socialist who opposed World War I. Led first Women’s Day protest against war, 1918. Member of Parliament, 1919-34.

Quotations

“War was the massacre of men, not for the defence of the frontier of one's country against a wicked, savage enemy, but in the interests of dynasties, dictated by greed of land or contrived by diplomatic intrigues.” (Autobiography of a Working Woman, 1912, p. 101; photo onb.ac.at)

Magda Portal

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Overview

Magda Portal born Barranco, Peru May 27, 1900 (d. 1989). Peruvian poet and feminist; anti-imperialist. Leader of Vanguardia literary movement. Founding member of Apristas, a nonviolent socialist revolutionary party.

Quotations

“It is not enough to be against war. It is necessary to be against everything that serves as an instrument of war.” (Kathleen Weaver, Peruvian Rebel, 2009, p. 135; photo oizquierdo.blogspot.com)

Katherine Anne Porter

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Overview

Katherine Anne Porter born Indian Creek, TX May 15, 1890 (d. 1980). Lifelong pacifist writer, Pulitzer Prize 1966.

Quotations

"If you are required to kill someone today, on the promise of a political leader that someone else shall live in peace tomorrow, believe me, you are not only a double murderer, you are a suicide, too." ("The Situation in American Writing," 1939, in The Days Before, 1952; photo Wikipedia)