Democratic U.S. presidential candidate Hillary Clinton when she was a student at Wellesley College.
Cheryl Lawson Walker holds a photo of her with Hillary Clinton, at her house in Los Angeles. On the day Lawson graduated from Wellesley College, a student had been selected to address the commencement at the women's school. The speech by Hillary Rodham, student government president, sent a jolt through the class. Walker recalls Rodham was "much more forward-looking” than many of her classmates, and it would be years before they, too, recognized the chauvinism they would have to overcome once they left school.
Recent Wellesley College graduate Emily DiVito holds a copy of the school's yearbook in St. Petersburg, Fla. DiVito, 23, says it is "completely important, hugely important" to her to see a female president at some point. But ultimately, she decided to support Bernie Sanders whose position on issues meshed with hers. "At the end of the day I voted for a single person," she says.
Mayor Laurel Prussing stands in her office in Urbana, Ill. Prussing is proud that a fellow Wellesley woman stands so close to the top office in the land. But she sees the achievement as more of a logical progression. "Listen, if it happened 20 years ago it would be different," says the Democratic mayor, a supporter of Sanders. "But people are used to women now. There's a whole new generation of young people who expect that women are equal."
Dr. Sarah Schlesinger Hirschfeld says of fellow Wellesley College alum Hillary Clinton's potential to be the first female candidate of a major political party in the U.S.: "I can’t even articulate all the reasons it’s important to me… I think it’s tremendously important for all women, whether they know it or not, to see a woman in the most important leadership role in the country _ and for men to see it, too."
Cheryl Brierton received her Wellesley diploma on the same day as Hillary Rodham Clinton. She recalls Rodham saying, "'We're going to get out there in the world and do all KINDS of things, and be all KINDS of things' ... It sure felt great to have someone speaking up for all of us."
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