What was it like for a woman in Oneida in the 1960s working in a man’s world? Four women tell their stories in a film documentary called “Women’s Voices” that will be premiered at Oneida Public Library Wednesday, Dec. 13, at 6:30 p.m.
A one-hour documentary, edited by professional videographer Michael Brown, the film presents four local women who sat down with Oneida High School student interviewers from Tom Kirkpatrick’s English class last spring to talk about their experiences in setting out as young women to make careers in the 1960s in fields dominated by men. The interviews were filmed by OHS students under the supervision of Peter Gillander at the OHS/PAC 99 studio.
The film’s subjects are Patricia Bruno, Mary Jo Nixdorf, Virginia Seminaroti and Nancy Fauls Walter. Bruno worked in Oneida banks and eventually rose to become a vice-president. Nixdorf, who enlisted in the U.S. Navy Nursing Corp, worked during the Vietnam War and retired with the rank of commander. Seminaroti became an English teacher in Oneida’s middle school, while Walter was a working mother, balancing the responsibilities of home with the demands of her bank job.
Virginia Drake, herself a retired Oneida High School teacher, provides the film’s narrative and, at one point, shares her own workplace experiences.
The Women’s Voices Project was an initiative of the OPL as part of its year-long celebration of the Centennial of Women’s Suffrage in New York State. It was supported by an Action Grant from Humanities New York.
The film’s showing is free and open to the public. For more information, stop by the Oneida Library, 220 Broad St., or call 315-363-3050.