ELIZABETH, NJ – In celebration of Women’s Heritage Month, the Union County Board of Chosen Freeholders is pleased to present “The Union County Government Women Trailblazers” exhibit now through April 12 at the Freeholders Gallery, located on the 6th floor of the Union County Administration Building, 10 Elizabethtown Plaza, Elizabeth. Gallery hours are from 9:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m., Monday to Friday.
The women whose photographs are on exhibit include:
Ann Baran, appointed the first woman County Manager in Union County and in the State of New Jersey in 1990. She developed the first grassroots coalition of labor, business, education and government in the state called the Union County Alliance;
Linda Carter of Plainfield, a member of the Plainfield City Council who became the first Black American woman to be elected to the Freeholder Board in 2010;
Carol Indursky Cohen, Union County’s first woman County Counsel in 1998 and a former Union County Freeholder from Westfield;
Florence P. Dwyer of Elizabeth, the first woman in Union County to be elected to the U.S. House of Representatives and served eight consecutive terms from 1957 to 1973. She championed women’s and civil rights;
Lillian F. Feickert of Plainfield, former President of the New Jersey Women’s Suffrage Association and founding organizer of the New Jersey League of Women Voters. She was the first woman to run for the United States Senate from a major party;
Helen Glaser of Clark, the first woman appointed to the Union County Board of Chosen Freeholders;
Mildred Barry Hughes of Elizabeth, the first woman to be elected to the New Jersey Senate in 1965. She also was elected to four terms in the New Jersey Assembly between 1957 and 1965, and served as Assistant Majority Leader in 1960 and 1961;
Mary Kanane of Kenilworth, Elizabeth, and Union, who was elected the first woman Surrogate of Union County in 1963;
Veronica C. Leonard of Linden, who was the first woman Department Head in the history of Union County when she was named County Treasurer for a three-year term in 1975;
Joanne Rajoppi of Springfield, the first Chairwoman of the Union County Board of Chosen Freeholders in 1980. She was elected the first woman Union County Register of Deeds and Mortgages in 1984 and in 1996 became the first woman Union County Clerk;
Libby E. Sachar of Plainfield, who was the first woman Superior Court Judge appointed in New Jersey in 1946;
Elfie Scheideler of Roselle, the first woman elected to a three-year term on the Union County Board of Chosen Freeholders in 1951.
For further information and to learn more about exhibiting at the Freeholders Gallery, please contact Teya David, Curator, at the Union County Office of Cultural & Heritage Affairs, 633 Pearl Street, Elizabeth, NJ 07202; telephone, 908-558-2550; or email culturalinfo@ucnj.org. NJ Replay users may dial 711.
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For more information on any Union County press release, please contact Sebastian D’Elia, Communications Director for the County of Union, or a designee listed at the top of this press release. Please join the County of Union online at www.ucnj.org, on Facebook at www.ucnj.org/facebook, and on Twitter athttp://twitter.com/countyofunionnj .