Women's History Month: Women in Florida

Vice President, Community Development Manager for South Florida for TD Bank. She manages community relationships and supports regional market retail and commercial staff in developing and implementing responsive community development lending, service and investment to revitalize and stabilize low-and moderate-income neighborhoods and financial empowerment for individuals in South Florida and along the Treasure Coast. Prior to joining TD Bank in 2014, Ana was the Regional Community Development Manager for the Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta at the Miami Branch. In that capacity she served as a commissioned bank examiner in addition to her community and economic development specialty. She has published several research papers and articles in addition to speaking both nationally and internationally on topics including concentrated poverty, remittances, community development finance, and financial empowerment. Born and raised in the Washington DC area, Ana has lived in Miami for 27 years and is fluent in Spanish. She is active in numerous community development and professional groups in South Florida and serves on the board of directors of South Florida Community Development Coalition, Miami Homes for All, Florida Community Loan Fund, Broward Alliance for Neighborhood Development, Community Housing Partners, and is president of the board for Centro Campesino Farmworker Center. Ana has a Bachelor of Arts degree in Communication from Albertus Magnus College in New Haven, CT and an MBA from Florida International University.

In 1992 she became the first black woman elected to Congress from Florida. Born in Tallahassee, she graduated from Florida A&M University in 1946 and was chosen to its Sports Hall of Fame. She earned a master’s degree at the University of Michigan in 1948 and later did graduate work at the University of Indiana and Florida Atlantic University. After a distinguished career in education, Carrie Meek was elected to the Florida House in 1979. She served there until 1982, when she became the first African-American woman in the state Senate. During her tenure, Meek sponsored legislation creating the Florida Commission on the Status of Women. A tireless advocate for gender and racial equality, Carrie Meek has received dozens of honors.

an Internationally renowned singer/songwriter from Miami, who is the single most successful crossover performer in Latin music history. In 1978 she graduated summa cum laude from the University of Miami with a Bachelor’s Degree in Communications and Psychology. Within all of her professional accomplishments, including five Grammy Awards, her commitment to helping others is what sets her apart. Away from the concert stage, Gloria is a philanthropist, humanitarian, a civic ambassador to the Miami community and a strong supporter of the people of her homeland, Cuba. Gloria has always made it a priority to devote her time and resources to the community. In 1990, tragedy struck when her tour bus collided with a semi-truck leaving her on life support. She required extensive surgery to fix her shattered spine and doctors believed that she would never walk again. Due to Gloria’s hard work and perseverance her rehabilitation was astounding; within one year of the accident she was on the road performing again. She is the founder of the Gloria Estefan Foundation (an open-door foundation) which includes various activities such as funding annual scholarships for students who need financial assistance, providing access to higher education and assisting abused and neglected children to name a few.

Helen Aguirre Ferré of Miami Shores is an award-winning bilingual journalist and communications consultant. She holds a B.A. in Political Science from Barry University and an M.A. in Inter-American Studies from the University of Miami. For more than twelve years, Helen has been the face of public affairs programming at WPBT2 (PBS affiliate), hosting the weekly series ISSUES and launching ISSUES REPORTS, an investigative arm of journalism reaching audiences from Florida’s Treasure Coast to the Florida Keys.

The first female attorney general of the United States.
She was born in Miami and educated in its schools. After graduation from Cornell University and Harvard Law School she returned to Miami in 1963. She worked in a variety of legal capacities there and in Tallahassee prior to her appointment as the first female Dade County State Attorney in 1978, where she developed programs for drug courts and domestic violence. Subsequently elected six times, she became a nationally recognized leader in criminal justice. President Bill Clinton appointed Reno attorney general in 1993.

Known worldwide as an early environmentalist, she is recognized for her advocacy of Florida’s unique Everglades. A Massachusetts native, she graduated from Wellesley College in 1912 and moved to Miami in 1915 with her father, who published the newspaper that became the Miami Herald. In World War I, she was one of the first women sworn into the U.S. Navy. She wrote for the Herald upon her return, and during the next decades, used Florida themes for national magazine articles. She also wrote three novels, a history, and other works, including poetry. Her 1947 non-fiction work, The Everglades: River of Grass, became a classic. In her eighties, Douglas headed the University of Miami Press, and in her nineties, wrote her autobiography and founded Friends of the Everglades. MS. magazine chose Douglas as a woman of the year for 1988, and she was honored on her 100th birthday in ceremonies in the Florida She was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom by President Clinton in 1993.

Zora Neale Hurston was an African-American novelist whose rich literary work has inspired generations of readers. Despite her reputation as a writer, there exists another side to Hurston's career. In 1938 and 1939, during the Great Depression, Hurston worked as a folklorist and contributor to the Florida division of the Federal Writers' Project (FWP), part of the Works Progress Administration. Through her work with the FWP, Hurston captured stories, songs, traditions and histories from African-Americans in small communities across Florida, whose stories often failed to make it into the histories of that time period.