S P RI N G 2 02 1
S U N DERLA N DV I BE . COM
With International Women’s Day landing on 8th March, we’re taking a look at the women who shaped Sunderland’s past and the women shaping Sunderland’s future. Introducing the Rebel Women of Sunderland; a stunning project from Sunderland Culture that shines a light on the lives of Rebel Women from the city, with specially commissioned artworks and stories from Kathryn Robertson and Jessica Andrews...
International Women’s Day: Celebrating the Rebel Women of Sunderland Dr Marion Phillips First female MP for Sunderland Marion Phillips was Sunderland’s first female MP. She was elected as a Labour candidate in the first-ever election in which men and women had equal voting rights. She marched down to the shipyards in her round glasses, demanding free trade and paid holidays for the shipbuilders. A salty wind blew up from the Wear and whipped her face, but she wrapped her big coat tightly around her shoulders and stood her ground. The workers cheered and stamped their feet. She was a fierce feminist who wanted working-class people to enjoy their lives.
Heroines of the past… Florence Collard & the Shipyard Women During World War Two, when men joined the army, more than 700 women stepped into their big steel toe caps, pulled on their overalls and got to work. Sunderland was once known as ‘the largest shipbuilding town in the world’ and the ships built by women during the war were vital in carrying food and fuel supplies. America’s shipyards rusted and languished without men to run them, and people across the world looked to the fierce women mending, hammering and storming 24
Sunderland’s docks for inspiration. The women drove cranes, welded metal, fixed rivets and laboured in freezing conditions. They worked 12-hour days, then went home to peel potatoes, sweep hallways and read bedtime stories to their children. They tingled with fear as the threat of bombs loomed over them. They thought of their husbands and brothers, who might never come home. Florence worked as a welder at Bartram & Sons shipyard and she was the first woman ever to be granted membership to the Boilermakers’ Society union.
