The Berkshire Conference of Women Historians formed in the early decades of the 20th century in response to women academics' sense of professional isolation. Although allowed to join the American Historical Association (the professional organization for historians in the US), women were never invited to the “smokers”, the parties, the dinners and the informal gatherings where the leading men of the profession introduced their graduate students to their colleagues and generally shepherded them into history jobs in colleges and universities. In an attempt to get to know each other, women who later formed the basis of the Berkshire group began to sponsor breakfasts at the AHA to establish a network among female historians, as well as to exchange ideas on professional activities.

Members in the 1930s

A group of about twenty historians from the faculties of the women’s colleges in New England and New York first met on a spring weekend at an inn in the Connecticut countryside in 1930 and constituted themselves the Lakeville History Group. In subsequent years, the group met at the Red Lion Inn in Stockbridge, Massachusetts, at the Shaker Mill Farm in New Lebanon, New York, and at the Mohonk Mountain Lodge in New Paltz, NY. Last year it returned to the Red Lion Inn in Stockbridge. Actually it is thought that the immediate impetus for the format of the a spring weekend came in response to a week-long retreat for male historians led by J. Franklin Jameson when he was the Executive Secretary of the AHA. Whereas the men's group collapsed when Jameson died, the women's weekends have continued to the present.

These informal, country gatherings have met every year since 1935, when the name Berkshire Historical Conference (since they usually met in Stockbridge), was adopted (in subsequent years the name was amended to the Berkshire Conference of Women Historians). This gathering, “The Little Berks,” is a weekend of hiking, conversation, sports, and general socializing, in addition to a business meeting where the officers for the Conference are elected and broad plans are laid for the Berkshire Conference on the History of Women (the “Big Berks”). Each evening there is a session where members discuss recent research in history. The Berkshire Conference especially encourages graduate students, junor faculty and independent scholars to attend these retreats.

 Here are some photos from recent "Little Berks" weekends....

The Berkshire Conference on the History of Women

The best-known aspect of the Berkshire Conference is the meeting of the Berkshire Conference on the History of Women, or “Big Berks,” held every three years. The Big Berkshire Conference began in the early 1970s and grew out of the flourishing of interest in women’s studies across the country. The first Berkshire Conference on the History of Women took place at Douglass College (of Rutgers University) in 1973. Expecting only 100 or so participants, the Douglass conference drew instead three times that number, prompting calls for another. The next year the Big Berkshire Conference met at Radcliffe and drew over a thousand participants (an enormous number by the standards of the time). In the next two decades the Big Berks was held at Radcliffe (1974), Bryn Mawr (1976), Mt. Holyoke (1978), Vassar (1981), Smith (1984), Wellesley (1987), Douglass (1990), and Vassar (1993).

  By 1996 the Big Berkshire Conference (now held every three years) had begun to draw several thousand participants from all over the world. By the mid 1990s the small liberal arts colleges could no longer accommodate the number of participants nor bear the expense of hosting such a large gathering, and bids were sought from larger research universities. The University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill hosted the June 1996 conference.

 In welcoming the participants to the 1996 Big Berks at University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill, Provost Richard Richardson emphasized the significance of this conference to UNC. Notably 1996 was the first time the Big Berks had ventured onto "traditionally co-ed" soil, away from the Northeast and into the South. And for UNC it was the first time in the college’s over 200 year history that it had canceled classes to accommodate an event. According to Provost Richardson, the university was acknowledging a women’s history conference with a place of importance (cancellation of classes) which, despite entreaties, had been refused even when UNC hosted the NCAA basketball championships!

 

In addition to hosting the Big Berks History Conference, and the Little Berks weekend retreats, the Berkshire Conference of Women Historians works with other organizations to improve the status of women in the historical profession and in society. It sponsors gatherings at the major historical conferences throughout the year and awards annual prizes for the best book and the best article in history written by a woman. It funds fellowships for graduate students through the Coordinating Council for Women in History (The CCWH/Berkshire Conference Graduate Student Award)In 1989 the Berkshire Conference helped to coordinate the Historians’ Amicus Curiae Brief in support of Roe v. Wade before the Supreme Court, and it routinely weighs in on other issues of concern to women, particularly those with a historical dimension.

The importance the Berkshire Conference has come to have in the last several decades mirrors the significant position women’s history and women’s studies has reached in the academy. Students who have majored or minored in women’s history and women’s studies are to be found in every conceivable profession. According to the American Historical Association, the concentration in women’s history and gender studies has been one of the fastest growing areas of the discipline. The development of the Berkshire Conference from an informal gathering of a few women in 1930 to a conference of thousands at a major university is an indication of that growth. Recently the Berkshire Conference of Women Historians celebrated the 70th anniversary of its founding. The festivities included a panel discussion entitled: The Berkshire Conference: The Next Seventy Years."