Beth Gilmore, Senior Director of Organization and Developmental Initiatives, SHIELD. Oral history conducted for inclusion in the COVID-19 Documentation Project, a collaboration between the University of Illinois Archives and the University of Illinois System.
Beth Heller, External Relations Manager at SHIELD Illinois. Oral history conducted for inclusion in the COVID-19 Documentation Project, a collaboration between the University of Illinois Archives and the University of Illinois System.
Beth Olwin Dawson (1911-2002) graduated in 1933. She was a member of the Pi Phi sorority, and she studied English with minors in History and French. Beth came from a more affluent family and therefore did not feel hurt by the Great Depression.
Bette Jean Nance Terry (1922-2016) enrolled at U of I in 1940 and became a member of the Alpha Chi Omega fraternity. In the interview Terry recounts her work as a reporter for the Daily Illini and the changes that took place on campus when many of the young men left school for the war, including her recollections of the only woman to assume the role of Chief Illiniwek, Idelle Stith.
Betty Ann Knight (1916-2014) was a member of the Class of 1938. She studied Home Economics, took a teaching certificate, and later earned a Master's. Betty Ann joined Alpha Xi Delta during college, but baby-sat to earn extra money during the Great Depression.
Born and raised in Chicago, Beverly Effort Biggs applied to Illinois at the encouragement of a high school teacher in 1961. Up until then, her educational environments had been majority - black. She came to Illinois at the young age of 16 and found a sense of belonging through the Black Greek system by joining Delta Sigma Theta her junior year. She remembers coming of age through the sorority and picketing with sisters in the Civil Rights Movement for fair housing.