Oral History Interview with Mary Zriny

BETSY BRINSON: This is an interview with Mary Zriny, at her residence in Louisville, Kentucky, and the interviewer is Betsy Brinson.

BRINSON: Let’s try again, Mary.

MS. MARY ZRINY: I was born December 30, 1942, in Indianapolis, Indiana.

BRINSON: Okay, well thank you Mary, for agreeing to talk with me this morning in preparation for this panel that the Women’s Political Caucus, and I guess the NOW Chapter are cosponsoring.

ZRINY: Well I feel very honored to be interviewed for this.

BRINSON: Well let’s start, if we may, with a little bit about your biographical background, sort of your growing up and your education.

ZRINY: I grew up in Kankakee, Illinois.

BRINSON: How do you spell that?

ZRINY: K-A-N-K-A-K-E-E.

BRINSON: Okay, and I will ask you that occasionally so that the transcriber can get it correctly.

ZRINY: Okay. Kankakee, Illinois, and it was a small rural town. Um, and I grew up there in the fifties (laughing) in a family, you know all my family was there; my mother, my father, my brother who is five years older. And we stayed there in Kankakee through high school, and then I went on to Southern Illinois University. At that time the only reason I went was because my mother encouraged me to do that to get a husband. And so—academics--I was a straight A student. I felt bored in school, but in that time in the fifties what was stressed was getting married; and that was the only purpose I saw in my life. And that’s what I did, I went to Southern Illinois to get a husband kind of thing.

BRINSON: In spite of that, did you have any early career interest while you were growing up?

ZRINY: Yes, I spent all kinds of time in the woods behind my house, and so that was a real love that I had. And I had clubs, and oaths. (laughter). I built forts back there and I was very attached to animals; we had lots of animal shows and um, you know lots of taking care of dogs and cats and observing animals in the woods.

BRINSON: Did you ever think of taking any of that interest though, and using it in a career when you were an adult?

ZRINY: Probably not. It was very repressive during that time. And I can remember when I was first told--well I was an athlete too, I was very naturally gifted I think as an athlete--and um, when it came time for swimming and I was a teenager; I was so concerned about make-up at that time, and I started dropping back from uh, being an athlete. And there were very clear verbal messages that being an athlete was being masculine: looking like Russian women throwing shot-puts, I don’t know (laughing) that was the image that I had. And so I was extremely discouraged from being an athlete, or being in the woods, or thinking practically. I mean it was just a very repressive, rural, conservative community. I was in the United, excuse me, the First Methodist Church, and uh, I was in the choir and I went to church camps, and I can remember my first political awareness. I was singing in the choir and I saw a family, a black family, come in and I had been taught to love everybody and accept everybody; but when a black family came into the church um—everybody--I could see from the choir loft how all of the white congregation moved away from the black family; and that was my, I knew that was wrong. And that was my first political awareness. Later I was in a sorority . . .

BRINSON: Let me stop you. Did you try to talk to anybody about that situation in your church?

ZRINY: Um, no. And, another thing that happened is that I had an African-American boy call me. I can remember him. And we’d sit and talk forever, and my mother--even though she had always told me to accept and love everybody--she’d say, “Who is that boy”, and all this. And then I was pretty well, not physically punished, I was never spanked or things like that, but I was emotionally very shamed for that.

BRINSON: Did you belong to any girls clubs or Girl Scouts, or did you ever go to an all girls school?

ZRINY: No I didn’t go to an all girls school, but I did belong to the Girl Scouts; and um, did some outdoors stuff with them, although that wasn’t real successful. And again the Girls Scouts, or the Brownies actually (laughing) were also very controlling and repressing. I can remember thinking how uncomfortable I was and how I wanted to get back to the woods and out where I knew things and felt more comfortable being free.

BRINSON: Had your parents gone to college?

ZRINY: My mother was almost a nurse and she decided actually not to pass her exam from the University of Chicago, because she was going to get married and wouldn’t need it. My father went through a couple of years of college, but he, being German was, I guess, a typical German Patriarch and did not want his wife to work. He really fought against me going to college and would not pay my way, whereas he paid my brother’s way. And I had to work through college and get scholarships, and he never really would support me in that or give me anything for that.

BRINSON: Is his last name Zriny?

ZRINY: No. My father’s name is Ballister.

BRINSON: Okay, because Zriny is not a German name.

ZRINY: That’s my married name.

BRINSON: Okay, I got it. Were there women or men Mary, who might have influenced you toward feminism while you were growing up.

ZRINY: Uh, not in the fifties other than the intense restrictions. (laughing) They were enough to motivate anybody; but uh even when I was in college and in a sorority--I was in Sigma Kappa--and uh I, my next political act really was I deactivated myself. Because when I became active in the sorority I found out that when pledge time came they would not take Jewish women or--of course African-American women were not even--it was all white. And um, as well as disabled women, and I deactivated after that. And I, as a result of that, my authorization at the University was pulled, and I had to pay off sorority debts because I didn’t show up for things like the Greek Sing; so they would dock you or fine you for not showing up. They would also make it really hard if you did things like not wearing heels, two-inch heels (laughing); but anyway I got docked a lot of money, plus just trying to stay in school and working my way through. So it was really hard, but I did it, and graduated.

BRINSON: And you finished, I believe in 1965?

ZRINY: Um-hmm, from college, undergraduate, yeah.

BRINSON: In sociology?

ZRINY: Yes.

BRINSON: Did you go to Southern Illinois in sixty/sixty-one?

ZRINY: Sixty-one through sixty-five.

BRINSON: Tell me, that’s a fairly large University, what was your sense in terms of having blacks on campus at that point. Were there any?

ZRINY: And this again is I’m sure very white perspective, but I don’t remember black students there, and that shows you were I was. You know, I was in a sorority that was very racist. I think I was very racists and classist. I mean I was a product of the fifties by and large and um . . .

BRINSON: What interested you in sociology?

ZRINY: I think it was just that, again, college was just so simple for me. It was so--but I didn’t take anything that challenged me. I just took something to get through in order to get a husband, and I was still doing that until graduate school. Uh, and the feminist movement changed my life, I mean that is the best thing that has ever happened to me. But up until that point I think I was a really classist, middle-class white woman.

BRINSON: Okay, before feminism though, were you involved in any civil rights activity/

ZRINY: Mm-mmm. Other than what I did, like political acts like I said on campus, and um, for a while I thought I wanted to teach emotionally disturbed kids. But that, the teacher thing was still like a wife-teacher thing. Umm and I’m trying to think, after I got out of undergraduate school, then I got married right away. I don’t remember thinking about it, I don’t remember making a decision, it was just where it was I was dating a man at that time who, it was like Animal House, uh he was like the I.D. Checker at the Rumpus Room, which was a wild place to be in the sixties. And um, but it you know, there was a big house where everybody partied, it was very much like the Animal House--the movie. And I don’t know, I don’t think I had my own identity at that time, I just did what I was told to do.

BRINSON: But you still continued to work on your undergraduate degree?

ZRINY: Well we got married and then went to Milwaukee for a short time and then came to Louisville. And at that point I was coming with my husband because that’s where he wanted to come, and there was a graduate school here that I could go to in social work. I thought that would be--at that point I think I was starting to--I went for a year without--being very isolated in Milwaukee; and that was a huge disillusionment. [laughing] I had, and I thought, there is no way I can sit around like this and not do something. And that is when I started considering something helpful to society. So, there was a graduate school here in Louisville so we came here.

BRINSON: Tell me about your introduction to feminism.

ZRINY: Oh, I remember that very, very well. It was in sixty-seven and several of us got together, several of us women, ‘cause I used to--when I was in groups I used to hang out with the men ‘cause they were interesting and the conversation was stimulating. So we decided that we would get together and see if we could talk, just talk about anything but men or babies or recipes. So, this was the first Sierra Group in Louisville to my knowledge, we didn’t call ourselves the Sierra Group we called ourselves A Cell.

BRINSON: Estell?

ZRINY: A Cell, like a prison cell. And a lot of women all over the country were beginning to do that now. At this point there was no publicity, there was no magazine article, feminism wasn’t a word. I mean there was nothing going on at that time and no connection or networking of any kind that I was aware of.

BRINSON: Do you remember any of the women by name that were in the group?

ZRINY: Oh yeah.

BRINSON: Can you tell me?

ZRINY: There was Stephanie Eaves, and Linda Handorf was her sister, and then there was Lela and I don’t remember Lela’s last name; I was thinking about that before you came, uh and there was Kathleen Davis, and that was the original group. But, we sat around and we talked about--we wouldn’t let ourselves talk about those topics like I said--but we learned to talk about other things. And we got to know each other and we found out that we had similar concerns; like we felt like we were going crazy. (laughing) And we felt like there had to be more to life. We felt like we were being treated unfairly; like we were being condescended to all the time; that it wasn’t fair; and why weren’t we happy with the unfairness of laws. And different things that we began to notice, and at the same time the black Civil Rights Movement was starting up, and we were all involved in the Black Civil Rights Movement as well. We started to be because the consciousness for me went to feminism to Black Civil Rights and back to feminism.

BRINSON: And at that point here in Louisville you had a lot of um, action toward open houses . . .

ZRINY: Oh yeah, I was in that huge, large . . .

BRINSON: And then you had a riot.

ZRINY: Yeah the riot, yeah. And I was involved in all of that, and when ( ) came to town Angela Davis was here in a little church over, you know on, we were in the Red Barn. And there was bomb threats and um, it was amazingly terrifying. And each time we did an action we really decided if we were ready to die or not, ‘cause we really thought we would. I had death threats, I had people sending me like Russian Communist Flags. I was not a Communists, I was a Grassroots Revolutionary in the United States. I was part of the Socialist Workers Party, and I uh, the theology, the theory, the belief system of socialism and democracy; I had some kind of combination in my head at that time of that, and I was very much against Capitalism. It was all about really changing the whole society, and we believed, at that time that we could really do that.

BRINSON: How big was the Socialist Workers Party here in Louisville?

ZRINY: Uh, it was over at that time--well it still is--over in the Braden Center; and Carl was alive, I met Carl a couple of times, I didn’t know him, but I met him. And Ann of course, I was a part of the Socialist Workers Party, but the problem then was even the sexism; and also in the Black Civil Rights Movement, was the sexism. I think the thing that really capped it all off was when Stokely Carmichael said that, “The only place for the women in the movement is at home.” And it was like there you go. How come? It was like we saw things as a combination of oppressed people, and the idea was to combine. And that kind of was happening except for the women, and women were still being used to do a lot of the grunt work and were not the leaders; and a lot of sexual stuff was going on. And so, that reinforced the feminism of realizing that we were not being included really.

BRINSON: I wonder, um in all of that with the Cell and your advocacy, if you had had the opportunity at that point to read Betty Freidan, the feminist book?

ZRINY: Oh yeah, yeah we got that right away. We considered that, at the time to be pretty mild. We were like much more angry than that, and much more outraged with what was being done to everyone, particularly for women. We, most of us brought our money at that time, our income and put it in. We put all of our time and our money into the movement, into our behavior, into our revolutionary behavior. We connected up with some of the attempts down in Hazard, Kentucky, in the unionizing of the mines, the coal mines and we had connections through Louisville there; we were involved with some of the draft dodging attempts, you know some men who were coming through Louisville to Canada, um and . . .

BRINSON: This was all really under the auspices of the Socialist Workers Party?

ZRINY: No, it was really under feminism ‘cause we pulled out of that, it was actually our group mainly. At one point as things developed, we could kind of see that the kinds of changes that we women were going through that if we didn’t include our husbands then this would be really awful. So we included our husbands, one man was a Black Panther, and so we were all included in this like Sierra Group of trying to develop a political consciousness together. At that point it was called People’s Liberation rather than Feminism, that got kind of stuck on later.

BRINSON: Was that strictly a local, or was there. . .

ZRINY: Yeah, by this time, this was all a group.

BRINSON: Was it national?

ZRINY: Yeah, we started realizing that there were all these connections. And like when ( ) came to town we were called from Boston, some women who had their own Cell up there just called and said, “Look this is what we witnessed here. ( ) has women who come in--like prostitutes who come in after the fundraiser, after the party thing; and so you might want to, if you want to you could have a demonstration about that.” So we went there (laughing) all of us, and sure enough in came two prostitutes; and we had a confrontation with ( ) at that time saying, “What are you doing? How can you have a political consciousness like this and then use women like this, and you’re married.” I think he was married at that time. I know somebody else was married.

BRINSON: And tell me about that, how did he respond?

ZRINY: Well he got real defensive and he was denying it and walking away from us, and we kept at him. And, and he was depicting us as, I don’t know what, as harpies or emotionally disturbed; or didn’t know what we were talking about; or hurting the movement or hurting him because he was doing such a good work. And, and that was always a conflict. It’s like how far do you confront a political activist? You don’t want to take anybody down when there are so few of us to begin with, but yet that was so unethical and so basically not okay.

BRINSON: And how many of you were there to confront him?

ZRINY: I think there were four of us were there, four or five of us.

BRINSON: Do you remember anybody of them by name?

ZRINY: It would have been the same group, it would have been all of us there.

BRINSON: Okay.

ZRINY: ‘Cause I can remember Kathleen and Stephanie. . .

BRINSON: And were there others with, ( ) who were local guys in particular that sort of backed him up in anyway?

ZRINY: Yeah, ( ) everybody, most everybody did, everybody kind of overlooked this. Uh, and everybody knew stuff was going on, and see it was because sexism was such an intrical part of male identity at that time, there really was no consciousness of anything and they really did not see that as not okay. I know they did, I know that infidelity and prostitution, I mean that’s kind of an obvious thing, but it was still ingrained in their consciousness, it took awhile. I mean feminist were really, really not welcome in the Black Civil Rights Movement for a long time. They saw that as to take away from the black movement and a lot of black women experienced a lot of pressure not to be feminist.

BRINSON: At this point in Louisville, I think there was the Women’s Political, no that came later.

ZRINY: Yeah, that came later. See there was no leadership. One of the things that I was trying to think about when you came to interview me was, we didn’t have leaders, there was not a hierarchical power. It was a communalism or a collective idea of power. Whenever we, later, okay, we were in the Sierra Group for several years, and then we decided if we feel this way, and--we’re having, you know--maybe other women feel this way. So we put out all these flyers around the University as well as everywhere we could think of, and we had so many women come to this meeting that we couldn’t even get in the door. And so what we did, is we offered to help them set up their own Sierra Groups.

BRINSON: Is that what the topic of the meeting was about?

ZRINY: Yeah, was, was, and this is what we told them what we were doing, how we were thinking, I mean we were packed, we couldn’t even get anybody in the doors.

BRINSON: Where did you hold this meeting?

ZRINY: It was down on Brook Street, and that is where we often met; in an apartment, in Stephanie’s apartment. Yeah, I don’t know if the building is still there, but the Brook Street--that’s the area where we always had our meetings; and also where we, we had a newsletter for a while out of our Sierra Group. See it was just that, and it was like Sierra Groups were all over; but there was this connection or hierarchical thing going on at all.

BRINSON: So when the women came to learn more about the Sierra Group . . .

ZRINY: Then they formed their own. And then, we really weren’t very connected to them either. We just went ahead and did our thing, and if they had trouble we would be willing to go and help them get through--like if there was trouble in the group. And there was, I mean it was difficult. See our group was very intense, very emotional, very (laughing) into processing things. And then we had gone through that for several years and we wanted to go on and do what we were doing, our actions, activism; and not to spend a whole lot of time--actually we thought that women had to do it themselves in order to progress through the growth.

BRINSON: Tell me about the newsletter.

ZRINY: Uh, it was very, very, very political; very small print, and very, very, very, very revolutionary (laughing). I looked for a copy; I couldn’t find any copies of it. I did not publish it myself, I mean I was in on--I read it, and I oversaw some of it--I think it was mostly Kathleen and Stephanie if I remember who were doing the newsletter. I wasn’t all for that: I didn’t think it was a good thing to do, ‘cause at that time I thought the less written, the less concrete. I thought it would be more copied and used against us kind of thing. Or that we’d waste our time doing that when I thought we should be out doing activism. But you know I supported it because I was in the Sierra Group and I could see their point of it.

BRINSON: Were the Sierra Groups primarily to talk through issues or were any of them in Louisville, that you were aware of, into some of the women’s health, learning to use the speculum . . .

ZRINY: That didn’t come--that came later--at that time it was all, I mean we were scared. We were saying stuff and doing stuff that was just--and plus we were in the Black Civil Rights Movement at that time, and I mean we were scared of the FBI, we were scared of being tapped, I mean we were very, very scared. There were lots of things going on over the country at that time. There were riots, and major arms build up in every city at time. And so, the police were very active in trying to figure out what was going on, so it was a real scary time period.

BRINSON: The local police.

ZRINY: Oh yes, everybody.

BRINSON: How did you know that?

ZRINY: Because they were at--like the Black Civil Rights, the demonstrations, they were all there photographing. And they were—you--I don’t know other than that; we knew the Klan were keeping track of us. The Klan would come in and come to meetings. Like, of course abortion became an issue, early it wasn’t—but--and the Klan one time, one woman was talking and they came in and stood against the back wall and just stood there.

BRINSON: And how did you know that they were Klan?

ZRINY: Well because, well they said they were.

BRINSON: Okay, they weren’t dressed in their . . .?

ZRINY: No, no they weren’t in Klan outfits, no. I remember when the Klan did march in the southern, well of course they marched lots of times in the southern . . .

BRINSON: Were they local people or did they come in from somewhere?

ZRINY: I don’t know. But there were all kinds of threats and spots that we thought, it would be hard to know. The reason that I’m saying this is in hind-sight, because I know what was done. Because we got our files after Hoover was out, and Hoover was a real sick man; but once he was out and they opened up the files we found infiltration of the FBI in Louisville, and in the Women’s Movement.

BRINSON: Do you all still have those files?

ZRINY: Um-hmm, no, we don’t even have our archives I don’t think.

BRINSON: Well that’s too bad.

ZRINY: Yeah it is. I left the country in seventy-one after I got out of graduate school because I thought that--my husband and I at that time had been real politically active, and we thought we were all going to be assassinated, you know. The Chicago demonstration happened and the police had just beaten everybody. I mean the police were all over the country just beating everybody up in riots, and all kinds of ways that they did that; and we really thought that we were going to be killed, so we left the country and we stayed away in Europe for six months. And I couldn’t stand it, I had to come back. I had survivor’s guilt, like I had left the edge and left everybody. When I got back it was getting--I don’t remember now--but I know it was getting intense, but everybody left. It was like Linda moved to Michigan, Lela went to California, everybody pretty well disbursed and um, this is when Nixon came in.

BRINSON: Okay, let me go back just a minute because you mention that uh, Angela Davis had been here. Tell me about that.

ZRINY: Well, she was at a church in the West end, and we couldn’t, most of us couldn’t even get in because it was so packed. And if I remember correctly there was a bomb threat on the church, and everybody stayed and we all hid in the Red Barn. Um, and all I can remember is that she spoke the truth, what I could hear of it; I mean because I crammed myself in the back.

BRINSON: And this would have been . . .

ZRINY: Oh jeez, I don’t know, it must have been sometime in the late sixties. ‘Cause I was in graduate school and in seventy-one is when I left for Europe. So it had to have been the late sixties.

BRINSON: Um, tell me your husband’s name?

ZRINY: Bob.

BRINSON: Zriny?

ZRINY: Yeah.

BRINSON: Okay. Was he supportive of your feminist involvement?

ZRINY: Oh yeah, and he was in his own. ‘Cause what happened after we tried to combine the two groups but it didn’t work because the women were so bonded that they decided they needed to learn how to bond themselves. So the men started their own group and they were in a group together, anyway, he became very politically aware.

BRINSON: How about your parents, were they aware of your activities?

ZRINY: No, not at all. My father a little bit, ‘cause I used to take books home to him, like I can remember once taking Black Rage. (laughing) ‘Cause my whole point, see I became a feminist physiotherapist because at that time it was so oppressive. I mean probably the mental health and religious institutions were the most oppressive institutions there were for women. Um, and you know like the tranquilizers came out in the 1920’s right when women got the vote. And I don’t think that--I think that drugs came into the whole nation in the sixties and I don’t think that that was too coincidental. Although Timothy O’Leary at one point was real um instrumental in consciousness raising. It wasn’t about abusing drugs, it was about consciousness expansion with drugs and it was--I think in the beginning it was a politically good thing to do. It helped people think outside the box--the fifties--and box really. But then later it became that drugs were just abused and for fun rather than for any kind of consciousness expansion. (laughing)

BRINSON: When you came back Mary, from Europe, what happened then.

ZRINY: Well, I came back and decided that I would be more like a reformist rather than a revolutionary. So I decided that I would go in the system and try to change it from the inside out. So I went out to Peewee Valley and became the Associate Superintendent out there.

BRINSON: What kind of a place is Peewee Valley?

ZRINY: It’s where all the felons in Kentucky go, women who are felons. It’s the women’s correctional institute, yeah it’s a prison. And uh, I actually I was Acting Warden for the first month I was there (laughing) because the person, Betty Kasalki had left for a--I think she did something else. And so the person who was there at that time had just kind of locked himself in his office and I came in very idealistic and very gung-ho. I think he knew a lot of political prisoners were going to end up in Pee Wee Valley, in fact, they went to Lexington Compound, but at that time I thought the would, you know I was going to be there at the prison. So I was going to be at the prison to help move things through and not let them get killed or whatever I thought was going to happen. And I don’t even know how I got into the prison system to be employed.

BRINSON: Let me stop and turn the tape over.

END SIDE ONE TAPE ONE

BEGIN SIDE TWO TAPE ONE

BRINSON: Um, tell me, what kind of women would have been political prisoners?

ZRINY: Well, at that time different women from different--from different groups were robbing banks and were involved in--I was never in any illegal behavior other than demonstrations; and I used to give lots of lectures and organize and stuff like that--but I never committed you know felonies or misdemeanors. Um although, anyway, but that some of the women were going on and trying to get money, and trying to make statements and so forth because it was so repressive at that time. It was like the only thing that seemed to get any attention both to the Black Civil Rights Movement as well as the Women’s Movement was acting out somehow, illegal acting out, civil disobedience or some form. So, that’s where--and I thought that women were just going to be arrested when Nixon came in. I just thought they were going to be taken out. As it was—they--a lot of leadership in the Black Civil Rights and the Feminist Movement was really co-opt, and a lot of black leaders were killed or they were co-opt one way or another; but the whole movement was taken out.

BRINSON: When you say that, is that true in Louisville as well as nationally?

ZRINY: Uh, a lot of the Black Civil Rights leaders, it seems like to me, uh wow that’s a hard one. Um, I don’t know as well, ‘cause I started pulling back from the Black Civil Right’s. I know Carl Braden of course died later. Ann continued on, but so much support withdrew from the black’s, you know. I think--but you know I’m guessing--a lot black leadership left; and I know the Black Panthers dissolved here in Louisville. And that got, it got all messed up, and I don’t know why. I don’t know if it was infiltration so that it was internally sabotaged, I don’t know, I really don’t know.

BRINSON: Um, how big was the Black Panthers here?

ZRINY: Uh, the Black Panther member of our group would not, he did not say. So, but I heard off and on stuff that was going on. But they were also about like getting kids lunches, and trying to organize the community and that was the main thing. I really think that the Black Panthers were pumped up in the white presses as a way to target them so that they were taken out justifiably, when in fact I think Black Panthers were meant to be like the million man march for self-esteem for black men and community concern. So you know, it all got so redefined and uh, you know to justify what happened.

BRINSON: Where you ever arrested?

ZRINY: Not until recently. I was in a civil disobedience thing where we all sat down in the street, and they walked us all into the police department (laughing), took our names and sent us back out.

BRINSON: What was the issue?

ZRINY: It was for the fairness issue.’

BRINSON: Oh, okay.

ZRINY: The ordinance trying to get rights, protection for work, social and living for lesbians, gays, transsexuals people.

BRINSON: Let me go back because um, I believe you were involved with the conference in Houston weren’t you?

ZRINY: Yeah, I was an alternate delegate to that, and yeah from Kentucky. And then the, I replaced somebody who couldn’t go or something happened so I became a delegate down there. And uh, that was really exciting.

BRINSON: Well tell me about that, I was actually there myself from North Carolina, but what was your perspective on it?

ZRINY: Well it was exciting, but from the background I came from it felt--I was frustrated out of my mind ‘cause there was nothing to it. I mean it wasn’t--we were making public statements actually. But the things that blew me away was that when I was flying in to Houston, that there was this big article with a little girl, and a little purse hanging on her wrist and a church window behind her and she is in prayer on her knees kind of thing. And it says, “Do you want her to become a lesbian?” So they characterized all of the women in Houston (laughing) because of this conference going on, and we are all over the United States; and they characterize this as a lesbian event. And I just thought, they’re really stretching on this one (laughing). Good Lord, so . . .

BRINSON: Well tell me about the Kentucky delegation.

ZRINY: Okay, one of the things I remember is that Thelma Stovall was there. Flew in on her jet with some women, and she went into the bathroom and she saw two women embracing and was ready to take her jet and fly home or something. I don’t know, but there wasn’t a whole lot of consciousness, and there was a lot of exclusion of lesbians at that time. It was like – don’t mess up our movement with your lesbian identity thing. Everybody who became a feminist was called a lesbian, and the Sierra Group I was in there was no lesbians. And as far as I know, later lesbians came into the movement, and we had to deal with the issue; and get through all of our own homophobia. But um at that time it was still--and a lot of lesbians who were at the convention had balloons like we are everywhere. And we had those orange bands on--or I did--protesting Anita what’s her name, down in Florida with the orange shoes, Bryant, Anita Bryant. ‘Cause she was so homophobic, and of course come to find out, she was very drugged. Later we found out that she was being physically abused by her husband, and so all of that was bizarre because at that time she was so, saying all of these hateful homophobic things.

BRINSON: Now at the time of the you Houston Conference though, were you a lesbian at that point, or had you decided you were?

ZRINY: Let’s see, what year was that?

BRINSON: Seventy-seven.

ZRINY: Yes. I had come out in seventy-five, and um that was a political decision for me at that time, because I had been in women’s community and I had gotten a divorce in seventy-two, when we got back from Europe. I think it was spending six months, twenty-four hours a day with one person. (laughing) I think we both went screaming. We lived, we stayed in a van, a Volkswagen van and toured all over Europe. But Bob and I really separated on really good terms, and at that time I was straight and I dated men. And uh, but I still stayed on at the prison and did political work there. And I got out of the prison and really started in earnest my career as a feminist psychotherapist. And I worked in the drug abuse center after the prison and I started--lot’s of women started coming to me saying, “Would you work with me, you know I feel like I’m going crazy and I don’t think it’s me I think it’s a reaction to”--there was a certain amount of anxiety and depression, a lot of psychological effects from oppression and sexism that have nothing to do with a woman’s intrinsic mental health. A normal reaction just like any oppressed people have psychological reactions to oppression. Low self-esteem, I mean, you name the symptoms women have. And unless you understand the context—it--you blame the victim, and not to mention all the sexual abuse that was going on there with both the women and the children. And so that at that point had not been revealed how much stuff was going on. I really think that sexual abuse in this country is used to control women. It is so prevalent. I mean there are estimates of two to three out of four women are sexually abused before they are eighteen. And you know that is probably accurate, where they--that is not what is said, I think it’s like two out of four is said.

BRINSON: Where there in Kentucky at the time of the 1977 convention, where there lesbians feminist groups that were beginning to come together?

ZRINY: We had, let’s see I came out in seventy-five ‘cause it just made sense. At that point I felt socialization of men and I was in--I felt really good relationships with some really good men--but we always hit this wall where there was a power differential or an identity thing or whatever. And then I would always have to get into this whole feminism fight and raise consciousness; and anyway, so eventually I decided that I would be--I decided I was very close to women anyway, emotionally. And that is what was important, was the intimate or the emotional connection that I could really talk with other women and be close. So I decided that I would put all of my energy, including sexual--and at that point I had not been sexually attracted to women--but I think it was a learned behavior like anything else; (laughing) but um, let me see I can’t remember the question.

BRINSON: Where there any formal groups . . .?

ZRINY: Oh yeah, we formed Mother’s Brew, which was down Main Street. And what it was, was like a community center for women, and particular for lesbians. And I can’t remember when this was but the--what happened is there was big controversy in the Feminist Movement about lesbianism. And so we made a big effort to include lesbians and then we had all of these big parties; and I know at one point we had--we nicknamed it the FLU, the Future Lesbians of America. And there were six of us in this group deciding if we were lesbians or not. (laughing) We’d discuss it and discuss it, and we’d go out and have experiences and come back; by that I mean we would dance or play. It wasn’t sexual, a lot of it wasn’t sexual for a long time.

BRINSON: Sort of like Future Homemakers’ of America.

ZRINY: Right, something like that. (laughing) So we did this, I don’t know, process, process, process. I don’t know, everything took five million hours to process that, everybody’s feelings, okay, before we could go on. No wonder we didn’t get very far. But anyway, we eventually formed Mothers Brew, and that was like, it was incredible. Oh that’s right, ‘cause I showed my photograph to Houston--I have a whole photograph thing--so I showed my photographs with the music Bread and Roses going on. And I showed all my photographs I had taken to the women. And I used to do lots of photography and photo journalism, as well as creative photography, um reflecting women’s’ reality or lesbian reality; or everybody’s reality; women’s reality. But I used to have slide shows down there; we had dinners down there; bands came in at that point. This was all underground, but we sang lesbian lyrics or women’s lyrics and women’s concerns. Because the idea of being lesbian wasn’t separated from feminism in my mind at that point. So it was like all women’s concerns, and it was very related to nature and not capitalism. It was all about communalism or collective you know, and lack of classes and no racism. You know we really tried to create a counter-culture that was loving, that was our goal, and inclusive. And uh, anyway we had dinners and we had poetry readings, we had pool and ping-pong competition, how is that for capitalism, but anyway a library . . .

BRINSON: How did you fund the resources to keep this place going?

ZRINY: We all, we all put in money. We just put in money into it, bunches of us; we put money into it.

BRINSON: And you know what a good night down there how many . . .

ZRINY: Oh it would be packed.

BRINSON: Yeah, which would be, what, how many people?

ZRINY: We had maybe a hundred, a hundred and fifty, because we had--it was a huge upstairs area. Lets see, I’m trying not to exaggerate it was mostly week--the building is gone--but the building was pretty big. I mean the area upstairs was huge ‘cause like we had separate rooms for pool, ping-pong, and a huge room for the dancing area where the band was; and other side rooms like a side thing. It was a huge area. So I don’t know maybe a hundred and fifty women, it would be packed on Saturday nights. We would all dance and we would dance in big groups; and see at that point the lesbian community was more like a community. It wasn’t like individual women or partners living around, or a couple of partners being together it was like a whole community identity. So coming out as a lesbian at that point was like coming out in a community of women. The sex was not even, that wasn’t the significant part of being a lesbian. It was, it really was political stuff. Now in the mean time the pioneers probably of lesbian movement, the so-called bar-dykes; of course they were the women who were beaten and they were really oppressed. And we were real busy in trying to include fight for their rights, and be inclusive of them too. And--but there was friction between bar-dykes and feminist lesbians, and that was really too bad; because in some ways the bar-dykes, butch-found thing was sexist. We saw it as being sexist, and a lot of women saw that as not being sexist, but just the way we were. But a lot women, I felt, saw that as not being sexist but just the way that we were--but a lot of women I felt that identified are young, but that still, I’m not sure I even think that anymore, I’m not sure what I think, but . . .

BRINSON: Where there ever any meetings of the two groups to sort of talk through the issues?

ZRINY: Oh yeah, yes, we tried to invite women to come in and they wouldn’t feel comfortable. And we’d go where they were and we wouldn’t feel comfortable. There would be fights and it was rough, it was real rough. I can remember there was a Queen Bee bar downtown which was--a lot of lesbians went there and I went there; and I mean there was a lot of drinking, a lot of fights, bottle throwing; and I thought I don’t belong here at all. I’m out of here. Uh there were other bars around town but, it was rough. A lot of women, in my opinion were being very self-destructive, and in part because they were oppressed.

BRINSON: And at the same time Mary, what was going on with gay men?

ZRINY: Well, I went to a gay liberation (laughing) meeting at the U of L campus back in seventy-four or seventy-five; and at that point--of course now we have united--but at that point the men were very, very, very sexist and they were making really rough comments about women. And so I think there was separatism for quite a while, but gradually that began to change. I wasn’t as much a part of that as I was open, in that as I was in the lesbian community, but that began to change and there were lots of women--lesbians that were involved with gay men and starting to build. And I can remember the first time a lesbian couple tried to get married in Louisville. Dan Taylor was their attorney, and what year was that, I can remember demonstrating downtown for that. It must have been in the seventies, and all they did was they laid it aside and they wouldn’t deal with it, and this couple and they’re still here in Louisville.

BRINSON: You mean the . . . .

ZRINY: The court, whoever, laid it aside it just got shelled out, it wasn’t even dealt with and Dan Taylor fought it like crazy. And then--now it recently came back up again and we were down in Frankfort testifying that it isn’t legal not to let us get married.

BRINSON: At what point do you think that men and women came together?

ZRINY: Well what I saw, of course this all from my view and I know that lots of other things were going on that I wasn’t aware of; but it was through the Fairness campaign. And at that point there was a real organized--although, no that’s not true--before that there was I think Lambda. I can’t remember the names of everything. There was a lot going on but it seemed like they were really the pioneers and then Fairness came out of that early, and that, those are some folks that I think that should be interviewed because they really took a lot of abuse.

BRINSON: And those are?

ZRINY: The men and women that were involved. I’m not comfortable giving you their names, and I’m sure that they are pretty out there.

BRINSON: But they were involved in the beginning . . .

ZRINY: Yeah in Lambda, and some of the other, no, before Fairness.

BRINSON: Okay. Tell me what role the AIDS epidemic had here in terms of the gay community.

ZRINY: Um, that’s a hard one for me to answer. I’m not sure, I know what it did to other cities better than I do what happened in Louisville.

BRINSON: Yeah, and that’s really what I’m registering from in some places, what happened is that many of the lesbian women became very active . . .

ZRINY: Oh yeah, became a lot of the caretakers and that happened here too. Not in a more organized way, I know that Jack Kersey and some other gay men really you know took a lead on some things. And I know that there was--what’s the community center--anyway, but that there was some rough stuff going on there that didn’t quite pan out right; and I don’t want to talk about that. But where I was, I didn’t--as a therapist I saw gay men and encouraged them to get tested and dealt with their diagnosis. And so as a therapist I saw that, but in the community I’m not clear on how many lesbians really--if there was a big shift over to take care of . . .what I do know though, is that we had a breast cancer event/fund-raiser where gay men did not show up; and we felt real hurt by that because a lot of us had directly, or indirectly been helpful, not as an organized thing, but that wasn’t reciprocated.

BRINSON: How recent was that?

ZRINY: Years ago. Because it’s changed a lot, Fairness I think, has changed a lot, and blended our communities better, at least for political targets.

BRINSON: How old actually is Lambda and Fairness, are we talking about seventies or . . .?

ZRINY: No. Fairness didn’t--to me Fairness is recent [laughing] but that’s because of my perspective. I know that we’ve tried to get the ordinance through for eleven years. So--and I know that the first attempts were long before Fairness, several years before Fairness; so I guess its’ been eight or ten years that its been in existence. But Fairness is a very targeted ordinance focus, it’s very main-stream, its very reformist, I mean that’s what that is.

BRINSON: And Lambda?

ZRINY: Uh that was much more comprehensive and included a lot more issues and I don’t know enough to say, it was real early.

BRINSON: Tell me about roles of the men and women in Lambda as you remember them. Did women play roles in it?

ZRINY: Yes, I think more so, at least here in Louisville, a woman was one of the main organizers here in Louisville.

BRINSON: How about with the Fairness?

ZRINY: Yeah, that has been a lot of very strong, confident women. I think the two founders of it were women and there has been like in a lot of cities. I know for instance in Minneapolis is that after things were set up by women, the gay men came in and kind of took it over and they were sexist and kind of the same old, same old. Which is what we fought in the feminist movement, and a lot of those values were not forward in the lesbian movement which I think is too bad. Uh, but in Louisville I think that the sexism was battled more so that the actual power was more diverse, and I think that that has been a real good thing. The balance has been better here.

BRINSON: Okay, let me just go back and just ask you, were you active with ERA at all?

ZRINY: Oh yeah. Everybody was. We marched in Washington and again it was like--I felt like Susan B. Anthony and those women because the vote--it was like getting the vote. And the vote was such a small part of the movement that it was kind of like yeah, but it was the ERA was tacked on like. There were so many huge issues, so when you file it all down to the ERA, but yeah, we were all a part of that; and felt that was fundamental even to get that, kind of thing, much less all the changes that we really saw necessary.

BRINSON: And then there was a fairly large effort, I guess, when it looked like Kentucky might rescind.

ZRINY: Oh yeah. That was an event and a half. Where the Governor flew out of town so fast so Finmore couldn’t stop the rescission of the--yeah that was quite interesting, that was really good.

BRINSON: I have actually been back and looked at a lot of those articles, and I interviewed Aly Hixon a few weeks ago. Tell me about the pro-choice effort here.

ZRINY: Well in the beginning that was huge. It was like more than the pro-choice per se, it was like womens control of their bodies, but it had to do with all health issues; it had to do with Civil Rights; it had to do with everything and so that’s how we all saw it. And for that matter I still see it that way today, that if we lose Roe vs. Wade that we have lost a lot more than that, it’s a lot of Civil Rights for women.

BRINSON: Were there organizations?

ZRINY: Oh yeah, yeah, and we all that was part of like, it was before . . .

BRINSON: For example was ( ) did they have a chapter?

ZRINY: Not early, that I remember. I remember NOW. It was an issue of NOW, I remember before NOW and then when NOW was formed it was one of the issues for NOW. I don’t remember what else was going on.

BRINSON: Was the Kentucky Civil Liberties involved?

ZRINY: Yeah, I’m sure they had that going, but I don’t remember. I probably do but I can’t think of it right now.

BRINSON: Planned Parenthood?

ZRINY: I don’t know that they were in existence at that time, or they may have been but I just didn’t know it. I don’t know much about it. All I know is that I marched for it and fought for it and got very criticized for it; and I used to give lectures about how religion was sexist, as well as a control thing ‘cause it all kind of went together. Boy did I ever get into all kinds of controversy.

BRINSON: Who did you give those lectures to?

ZRINY: Oh women’s groups and um, and oh there was this, when I was in graduate school, I was doing an internship. They had these community forums and at that time I would go to these community forums and I was part a leader on them. And I would bring up all these topics on them, and they’d just kind of sit there and we’d get into it. I can remember talking to JCC and of course the NOW. The NOW meetings used to be packed; we would have like a couple of hundred women there it was so huge, and we would present programs. And then I did things, like I did workshops and programs like assertiveness training, and just talks about feminism and oppression and mental health and feminism. I did lot’s of that. I went to churches, which was probably as bad; I remember one time a Priest was real upset with me. Uh what else did we do. I remember one time in Frankfort that--and I think I can say this--Lucy Frybirt was there and we were at this thing about abortion and pro-choice. And um, this crowd gathered around Lucy as she was leaving and they were like spitting on her, and chanting her vows back to her as a nun, and all this stuff because she supported things they didn’t think she should. And I can remember another woman—‘cause I’m five foot eight--and another big woman and I kind of--and she was still trying to reason with them and she was really getting--I believe she was having physical hurt. And we got on each side of her and kind of walked her in, and escorted her out of there.

BRINSON: And this would have been a rally in Frankfort?

ZRINY: This was before we went to Houston. It was a meeting, a pre-delegate meeting.

BRINSON: How did women’s groups raise money for their issues?

ZRINY: Well we didn’t. It was just our own money, and we didn’t even think like that.

BRINSON: So no fundraising?

ZRINY: Not that kind back then.

BRINSON: Even the NOW chapter?

ZRINY: I can’t remember, ‘cause I know that fund-raising, and even the Fairness that’s been institutionalized like actual fund-raising for years. But even before that it was like donations or you see the need and you know you need to do that in order for someone else to go someplace, or for all of us to have gas to get in the car to go to Frankfort, that’s the way.

BRINSON: Are you still active with NOW?

ZRINY: No, I haven’t been active with NOW for a long time. And part of the falling out was when all the lesbian and the straight split happened. And a lot of the politics in NOW I had trouble with and I felt they were way too compromised and moderate; and I don’t know, I guess I think that anything is good. Like if we can do anything like staying alive that’s good. But at that time I pulled way away from NOW.

BRINSON: What about women’s involvement around ( ) were you or were their elements in . . .

ZRINY: Yes there were definitely union organizers that were all part of the underground ‘cause they were being really messed over. Like the couple that was in Hazard where they broke into their house and found so-called communists literature around, and they were trying to arrest folks for all kinds of reasons and ways. And they would come through Louisville, and in what was like an underground railroad for a lot of different people so they were kept in our houses and . . .

END TAPE ONE SIDE TWO

BEGIN TAPE TWO SIDE ONE

ZRINY: Some of--and talked with a lot of people but you know I didn’t have direct connection with it, but I …

BRINSON: Okay. Who led, if you know, the effort to eliminate the classified ad for—you remember those in the Employment section in the paper? When you ( )

ZRINY: Oh, yeah. No, I don’t know.

BRINSON: You don’t know?

ZRINY: No, I don’t—‘cause see I pulled back out of the so called Feminist Movement at the time I went into Lesbianism. So my life changed a whole lot, and I became active in the lesbian community; and part of that was separatism. And so I was into that for quite a while; ‘cause I couldn’t see ( ). To me our whole government, and our whole policy of our country was really going backwards fast with war and all of the programs for the poor. I mean, it was just going backwards; and I couldn’t see a way to function within the system. And I was devastated I think by Kennedy’s death, and Robert Kennedy and Martin King, and all the rest of the deaths that happened after that, I just …so I stayed pretty well in private practice and …

BRINSON: Did you continue with socialist workers parties?

ZRINY: No. Because I—that and Communism, as much as I knew about it at the time, I thought it was also …very not okay and male dominant and all that.

BRINSON: I want to ask you about a few things just because I want to try document as best we can a few other things that were going on here in Louisville. Was there a womens book store for example?

ZRINY: Oh, yes. There have been off and on, several.

BRINSON: Do you remember anything about the early ones?

ZRINY: No. I can’t even remember where they were. We had Centers here too. Ah, community acts and Jack ( ) had a building he rented over in Germantown I think it was. Where were the other Centers? Oh, I’m sorry I can’t remember. And women opened up book stores, but they couldn’t make them go. And then once the big retailers came through then that pretty well wiped that out. So everybody now like there are lots of book stores like in Minneapolis and other places and women order their books if they don’t want to go through the big ones. But I can’t, I’m sorry I can’t remember. I know we had a library for a long time. And then we had a—we had a house on Brook Street where we had another library, and we had meetings and that is where we had the gynecological you know check outs. We had health—we were getting very concerned about health—women’s health because there were no studies, there was really no different I mean women were not considered in health. I mean research at that time. And so we figured that one out and ( ) and we were trying to figure out alternative health at that time. But we had a house—again—on Brook Street and we had the whole house and we had—and women stayed over there who were being abused, ‘cause there were very few shelters, if any over there at that time. And that wasn’t recognized as a concern.

BRINSON: Right. Well, that came later. That came late seventies I think. Along with displaced homemaker and ( ).

ZRINY: Yes, that’s right. That’s right. Yeah. Yeah.

BRINSON: And whatnot.

ZRINY: And again all the different cities were lurching around at different levels, and I didn’t know what other communities were doing necessarily but this was where we were..

BRINSON: Was there ever a feminist newspaper here?

ZRINY: Ah, let’s see NOW, and what else was there? Yes, we had—what did we have? Oh we had--we published poetry, lesbian poetry books. We had a publishing thing though that was very small scale, but we published pamphlets and things and would hand them out. Well we had a newspaper. I wish I had checked this out better for you, but yes we had a newspaper.

BRINSON: Did you ever seek political office?

ZRINY: No.

BRINSON: Why not?

ZRINY: I wouldn’t—to me it’s—no. I feel that I could do more political change through myself as a therapist and to offer women a healthy opportunity to grow, and also through art. I used to do a lot of political hopefully, consciousness raising stuff. I also think I am a pretty good

public speaker. At least I used to be. I haven’t done that for a while. But I think my last big attempt was—I had been involved in a three-hundred dollar—not three-hundred dollar--a three hundred acre project of trying to build a center for women to come to who are playwrights and

activists who needed a break. Who needed a retreat. And so it was down at Springfield Kentucky, and we had three hundred acres, plus three houses. We were building—we renovated two old houses and built another one; and we were in the process of making this a huge center for that, for retreat for women; lesbians and straight women to come.

BRINSON: And what happened to it?

ZRINY: And we worked on it for five years, four years and got it in—I don’t know. It just kind of fell apart. My relationship with the woman I was with at that time fell apart—I think we were exhausted. We just—and we were so close, it was just like—and then since then I have been trying to figure out where I am. And now I am kind of an older lesbian in the community. Trying to understand that, you know I am almost sixty it does make me that. And so—and beginning to connect with other women because there aren’t a lot of older lesbians who are very are out, any more. And I was in the fist wave of pretty out folks. Other than of course ( ) were pioneers in the real, uh …

BRINSON: We talked about the seventy-seven Women’s Conference, but were there any state-wide networks on women’s issues in Kentucky during this time? Were there active groups outside of Louisville, like Lexington or …?

ZRINY: Yeah, I know in Lexington they had a lot of things like that going on there; but when this kind of organization started that’s—I was out. ‘Cause I felt that it was like, part of the establishment.

BRINSON: Okay.

ZRINY: And I did not think any real ( ) would take place. I thought it would be assimilated and be neutralized and we wouldn’t make any real political change at that time.

BRINSON: Last question: What do you think the modern Women’s Movement accomplished in Kentucky?

ZRINY: Oh, gee. I think we accomplished amazing things. Certainly psychologically we did. We really opened women’s minds, I hope--to think and to know, and to have more self-esteem. But I have watched—it almost is like we are back in the fifties again. It is just breaking my heart. And political consciousness—young women on campus—and I taught, I forgot to tell you that—I taught that; I taught Women’s Studies and I taught ( ). Um, but I just--it is just such a turn-around it makes me really sad. So I now though I feel a lot of women assume certain rights. They just feel that it is just there, and they don’t understand that it didn’t used to be but they don’t have to. They can just go ahead and assume and keep going. There still a lot of women in more alternative careers and—but I just hope it doesn’t turn all they way back around.

You know there has been, I don’t know how many women’s movements in the eighteen forties, and of course, kind of culminated with the vote in the nineteen twenty. And before that I mean I think we went through another huge wave of it, and unfortunately I think we are going to—and I thought maybe when Clinton came in it would—we would pick up and it might happen but—talk about confusing—I mean Clinton makes me feel crazy (laughs). ‘Cause on the one hand he was ( ) and on the other he was so ( ).

BRINSON: Go back Mary and tell me about teaching Women’s Studies.

ZRINY: I taught JCC and …

BRINSON: That’s Jefferson …

ZRINY: Community College.

BRINSON: Community College.

ZRINY: What else did I do during that time?

BRINSON: And what period were you teaching and how did Women’s Studies come about at Jefferson?

ZRINY: Yeah, I—I don’t know who—I think one of the professors there was instrumental there in getting the class going. And then I was asked to teach it. And I was already teaching like Modern Sociology and Introduction to--whatever it was. Sociology and Modern Social Problems. But anyway the Women’s Studies Program was really good because there were three of us—I was doing the sociology of women, and another woman was doing literature, and another woman was doing what?—it was a three …

BRINSON: Maybe just ( ) of something?

ZRINY: Yeah. And that was it, and we did a three section thing and it was packed. We had a hundred students, and they got to take different—we had big lectures and then broke the group down into small lectures. Smaller groups so that we could—ah, and I thought it was a really good …

BRINSON: So you ( ) obviously?

ZRINY: Yeah, yeah. And it was fun. It was really fun. ( ) women and it was really stimulating.

BRINSON: Do you remember …?

ZRINY: No I don’t remember the other two women.

BRINSON: And what period are we talking about?

ZRINY: Ah, here we go again. I know I was in private practice. Because I went into private practice in seventy--I think it was three or four and I have been in private practice since then. I was teaching—it must have been about that same time period. I know there were Viet Nam vets in there, and there was all the controversy we were making back then; because I had a lot of Viet Nam vets in therapy too.

BRINSON: Is there anything else you want to add to this interview?

ZRINY: Oh, other than—I don’t know. I just hope that a lot of , you know, women and younger women understand the history; because if that gets lost our identity gets lost and our self-esteem I think goes down. We just have to know so we don’t keep reinventing the wheel, and women literally have died for this and—in all kinds of ways. And I would just like women to understand the context and understand themselves in their political context, so they can make—they can see.

BRINSON: Okay, thank you very much.

END TAPE TWO SIDE ONE

END OF INTERVIEW.