By Livia Lee Garza
“There was never anything like it.”
This opening line from The Spirit of Houston, the official report of the 1977 National Women’s Conference (NWC), encapsulates the unique and momentous nature of the event. Never before had so many women of diverse backgrounds from every corner of the country come together to voice their needs on a national stage, particularly under the aegis of the federal government. For four days in Houston, delegates devised and refined their National Plan of Action addressing the priorities of American women. Driven by a shared desire to “move history forward,” they deliberated over a comprehensive range of resolutions covering topics from childcare to international affairs.
Although the final report foundered nationally in the increasingly conservative political landscape, echoes of the NWC can be seen throughout the women’s rights movement into the present day In moving history forward, the NWC and its attendees also made history. The endurance of a legacy, however, hinges on its preservation. Historical narratives are rarely static; rather, they are constructed and reconstructed over time, built upon the memories and ephemera that remain.
The University of Houston’s (UH) Special Collections endeavors to preserve the NWC’s legacy through its collection of materials associated with the event. The conference initially emerged as a reoccurring theme between serendipitous donations in the late 1990s and early 2000s and has since become an established collecting area for the archive. UH’s growing acquisitions enable researchers and the community at large to explore the individual and overarching narratives of the conference and its attendees.
Once the National Commission of the Observance of International Women’s Year (IWY) selected Houston as the NWC host city, Nikki Van Hightower commenced extensive preparations. Hightower, the appointed women’s advocate for the City of Houston, served as the city’s liaison to the conference. While Hightower’s papers encompass more than her involvement with the NWC, they do showcase her efforts to secure meeting spaces and coordinate between local officials and organizers in the year leading up to the event. In a letter from December 1976, Hightower requests a meeting with Houston women anticipated to be “critically involved” with the NWC.
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For more information on archives related to the NWC, visit the University of Houston Special Collections, Carey Shuart Women’s Research Collection:https://libraries.uh.edu/special-collections/shuart
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