Myra Williams Papers, 1937-2021

Printable guide [HTML]

Summary

Creators:
Myra Williams Susan Calico Princene Hutcherson Earl White Ethel White
Abstract:
Extent:
3 linear feet (3 archival cartons)
Language:
Preferred citation:

Myra Williams Papers. Bay Area Lesbian Archives

Background

Scope and content:

The records span the years 1937 though 2021. This collection is arranged in eleven series: General; Education; Employment; Journaling; Travel; Correspondence; Affiliations; Financial Documents; Dementia Years; Photographs; Sports Trophies

Biographical / historical:

It is evident from this collection that Myra Williams was meticulous in organizing her life, committed to preserving her writing and her history. Throughout her adult life, she used her creativity and drive to define who she was as a worker, educating herself both in academia, sales, and in the trades. Self-awareness and self-improvement were strong motivators in the paths she took and the choices she made. Myra Carolyn Hutcherson was born May 21, 1937 in Montgomery, Alabama to Princene Hutcherson and Earl White. They were unmarried. Her mother cared for her until Myra was four, when an arrangement was found for Myra to live with a paid caretaker, Miss Griffen, who was also caring for her own grandchildren. Myra would not see her mother again. In 1950, aged 13, Myra went to live with her father and stepmother, Earl and Ethel White in Los Angeles, and started junior high at St. Patrick School. This collection contains her transcripts from junior high and four different high schools, until graduation in 1956 from Susan Miller Dorsey Senior High. For the first three high schools, she remained for just one semester. This collection also contains materials concerning the sexual abuse she survived from several family members, including her father, an uncle, and possibly a priest. In 1956, at the age of 19, she attended nursing school at Los Angeles City College, withdrawing in the fall of 1958. For the following six years she attended City College on and off to improve her skills, taking such classes as typing, programming, and statistics, as well as others. She supported herself during these years with any job she could find, generally low-paying. In 1966 she entered Los Angeles State College (later UCLA), graduating with a B.A. in English in 1969. She had a short marriage with Morris Williams during this time. In 1969 she moved to the San Francisco Bay Area, living in the East Bay, and began her graduate studies in English at the University of California in Berkeley, and in 1972 she achieved her Masters in English. While in Oakland, she married her second husband, who appears to have had the same surname Williams as her first, and they were married between 1971-72. In 1972 Myra moved to Santa Cruz, CA to begin teaching English at Cabrillo College. The College sponsored her trip to Sacramento to attend a Womens Convention, where she came out as a lesbian. She remained teaching at Cabrillo until 1977, whereupon she moved back to the Bay Area and made Oakland her home for the rest of her life. Given her traumatic early childhood experiences including abandonment by her mother, Myra suffered severe loneliness and depression throughout her life, and questioned her ability to form attachments. Determined to face the overwhelming emotional challenges of her history, she looked to teachers, ongoing programs and trainings to help her face her demons. She explored various subjects and modalities including spirituality, Eastern approaches, and journaling as well as meditation techniques, working with leading practitioners in the fields of self-improvement and self-knowledge. This collection has much of her writing during this time, both in journals and during the courses, classes and workshops she took. At the same time, she looked to psychotherapy and women’s support groups to further the changes she wanted to make. Continuing to explore her talents and the possibilities for satisfying career work, she went to Contra Costa College’s School of Culinary Arts, and also started a gardening practice. See her gardening journals in this collection. In 1981-82, she again turned herself toward training for a new occupation, that is, plumbing. In the late 1970s and 1980s women in general and lesbians in particular were getting training in the trades, plumbing, electrical, carpentry and so forth. In 1979 Tradeswomen, Inc. was founded in the San Francisco Bay Area, to assist women breaking into formerly male-only jobs in the trades, offering workshops, training, resources and support groups for women as they faced resistance in the job interview process, and sexism and homophobia on job sites. They published a magazine called Tradeswomen. This group remains active today. Myra opened her own business “Wonder Woman Plumbing” in 1982 and ran this business until 2006. This collection includes work orders, notes, purchases, financial records and other documents pertaining to Wonder Woman Plumbing. From 1989-98, she was a plumber for the City of Oakland and later the Berkeley School District. Additionally, in this period, she supplemented her income by working as an independent contractor in sales for a number of companies, including Multi-Pure Water Filtration Systems and NIKKEN. It was important to her to do this work well. She took a course to learn the finer points of sales, and was ultimately awarded with several certificates of excellence from these companies. Ever the sportswoman, Myra participated in the Gay Games in 1994, 1998, 2000, and 2006, competing in a number of sports, winning gold and silver medals in Racquetball, Table Tennis, and Darts. Some of these medals and trophies are included in this collection. Playing and watching sports remained an enthusiastic focus throughout her life. During the Second Wave of Feminism, Myra was an active participant in a number of women’s groups, and Black women’s groups in particular. This collection includes materials from “African American Women 40+ and Friends,” and WOFF (“Women Over Fifty and Friends”). This collection also includes correspondence, folders with many greeting cards, and some letters from friends and family demonstrating her wide circle of friends and cohorts. As evidenced by the photographs in this collection, it is clear that Myra’s friendships included women from a diversity of backgrounds, i.e., race, age, and class. As a part of the extensive photographic series in this collection, there are photographs of her birth Mom and her Dad including many pictures of him as a young man, her step-mom, and extended family. There are graduation pictures, travel pictures, photographs of her two husbands, photographs at work and at play, revealing both her seriousness and her fun-loving nature. In 2012, Myra was diagnosed with dementia, and “A Circle of Friends” was formed to help care for her, who remained at her side until her death. This was a tumultuous time for her and her friends, with Myra moving from one housing option to another to another as the disease progressed. Still her friends organized birthday parties for her and did what they could to keep up her spirits and their own. This collection features detailed notes from caregivers’ meetings, and email correspondence between the individuals. Myra Williams died in 2021 of dementia and endometrial cancer.

Acquisition information:
Gift of Cathy McIntosh, 2023

Access and use

Restrictions:

Collection is open for research. Advance appointment is required.

Terms of access:

The owner of the collection is Bay Area Lesbian Archives (BALA). The copyright is retained by the estate of Myra Williams. All requests for permission to publish, reproduce, or quote from materials in the collection should be obtained from BALA staff.

Preferred citation:

Myra Williams Papers. Bay Area Lesbian Archives

Location of this collection:
P.O. Box 18684
Oakland, CA 94619-0684, US