The National Canal Museum is debuting a new special exhibition titled Beyond Rosie and Rivets: Industrial Women of the D and L Corridor on the opening day of its season – April 2, 2022.
Beyond Rosie and Rivets: Industrial Women of the D and L Corridor highlights the work of women employed in some of our region’s iconic industries: steel, silk, cigar-making, the needle trades, and transistors. For many of these industries, the work force was predominantly women.
“Some industries in the Corridor moved here because women were available to do the work needed. Women’s labor helped support their families and themselves when a man’s wages could not,” said Rachel Lewis, the D&L’s new Diversity Research Historian. “By looking at our region’s history through the lens of the work of women, we see the fuller complexity and richness of our story.”
Photographs, artifacts, and oral histories in the Beyond Rosie and Rivets exhibition celebrate the women who stepped up into defense work in our region’s heavy industries in wartime, the young girls who spun and wove silk into a world-leading industry in the early 20th century, the seamstresses who clothed the country, and the mathematicians and engineers who broke gender barriers during the second half of the 20th century.
The National Canal Museum also encourages the public to submit their own stories. Women who lived and worked in the Corridor and who worked in places like Dixie, Western Electric, in garment factories, or any other industry in the five counties of the D and L, Luzerne, Carbon, Lehigh, Northampton, or Bucks, may submit pictures of themselves to: canals.org/exhibitions/tell-us-her-story/. Family members may also submit pictures on behalf of their relatives. Submissions will be featured in a rotating presentation alongside the exhibition.
Beyond Rosie and Rivets: Industrial Women of the D&L Corridor is on display from April 2 through Dec. 18. This exhibition was made possible in part by the National Endowment for the Humanities, the County of Northampton’s Hotel Tax Program, and the Pennsylvania Historical and Museum Commission.
Located in Easton’s Hugh Moore Park, the National Canal Museum is open on weekends from April 2 – June 5, 11:30 a.m. – 4:30 p.m. It will open Wednesday through Sunday starting June 8. The Museum’s mule-drawn canal boat rides aboard the Josiah White II will begin June 4.
Museum admission is $8 for adults, $7 for seniors (65 and above), $6 for children (3-15), and free for children under three. As a member of Blue Star Museums and Museums for All, the National Canal Museum provides free admission to active-duty service members and their families and to families receiving food assistance (SNAP benefits). Admission is free to members of the Delaware & Lehigh National Heritage Corridor.
The Delaware and Lehigh National Heritage Corridor and its signature program, the National Canal Museum, are dedicated to connecting residents and visitors to Northampton, Lehigh, Bucks, Carbon, and Luzerne counties’ enduring industrial heritage and are excited to do so in-person at our facilities in Hugh Moore Park. Additional information about the National Canal Museum is available by phoning 610-923-3548 x400 or by visiting canals.org.
The Delaware and Lehigh National Heritage Corridor is a 501(c)3 non-profit organization that preserves the historic pathway that carried coal and iron from Wilkes-Barre to Philadelphia. Today, the D and L connects people to nature, culture, communities, recreation and our industrial heritage. For more information, visit delawareandlehigh.org/.
