This spring, six IIT alumnae from the 1940s and 1950s met for lunch at the University Club in downtown Chicago.
Arriving separately, they recognized one another immediately and greeted each other warmly. To an outside observer
watching the lively conversation and easy laughter, they appeared to be good friends catching up.
And yet the paths of most of these women did not cross in the years after they left IIT. On this May afternoon,
however, Karin Turnquist, Marie Ekvall, Rosette Backas, Alice Koplan, Millie Delahunty, and Jeanette Metzdorf
celebrated the alumnae bond that still joins them after more than 50 years.
That distinction is an especially powerful one for emeritus alumnae (those who graduated before 1955), as they were
outnumbered by male students by as much as 33 to 1.
?You were very aware of the other women on campus,? said Delahunty. Backas added, ?It was very hard to be
inconspicuous.? Turnquist had a particularly memorable experience of the ?fishbowl? environment on campus. ?I
changed my outfit at a fraternity house dance and accidentally left it there?and it was later written up in the
school newspaper,? she laughed.
Although their presence on campus was visibly noticeable, making their voices heard took a little more work?a challenge
the women did not shy away from. Walking into a physical education class, which was at that time a required course,
Delahunty and her female classmates were told that there was no programming or facilities in place for women.
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?The instructor threw up his hands and said to us, ?Why don?t you just do whatever you want??? said Delahunty. The
women would indeed do just that: ?Being the agitators we were, we worked on the administration until we got a part-time
female physical education instructor and had part of the locker room partitioned off for us,? said Delahunty. ?We didn?t
take no for an answer,? added Kopan.
While these women advocated for physical amenities on campus, they also worked hard to change the perceptions of those
around them. ?Going into such a male-dominated college, there was an attitude that we were going to get our ?MRS?
degrees,? said Delahunty.
If that was the initial opinion held by fellow students and faculty, however, the women quickly reversed it by excelling
academically. ?I remember my first chemistry class,? said Delahunty. ?The instructor said, ?Look to your right and to
your left. Two of you won?t be here next year.? And it was true. And the ones who weren?t there were men.?
This strong intellect and determination to succeed academically presented a minor social conflict for women at that
time. ?If I was dating someone and I earned a higher grade than he did, I noticed a change in his behavior,? said Kopan.
?After awhile I just decided to keep my mouth shut.? From the nods her comments elicited around the lunch table, it?s
clear that it wasn?t uncommon for IIT women to find themselves in that situation.
While the men on campus may not have been receptive to women competing with them academically, they did allow the women
to help them sharpen their social skills.
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?We taught the engineers how to dance,? Delahunty recollected. ?We lined them
up in the auditorium and taught them the steps to the fox trot and the waltz, then took each of them around the hall
once.? Laughing, she added, ?We considered it a public service.?
With the exception of Turnquist, who graduated with a degree in biology, and Metzdorf, who received a degree in arts
and sciences, the other four alumnae studied home economics?a popular academic path for women at that time. While the
phrase ?home economics? may conjure images of Martha Stewart home improvement projects, IIT?s program was not for
anyone lacking left-brain skills.
?Some of the home economics programs at other schools didn?t even have laboratory courses. At IIT we had four years
of labs, including chemistry, physics, and bacteriology,? said Ekvall. That background led Ekvall to a successful
25-year career with the U.S. Food and Drug Administration. ?At the FDA, you work with all kinds of nutrition,
medicines, and radiation. I had to have that strong science background.? Along with the rigorous curriculum, the women
identify IIT?s focus on critical thinking as an important part of their education. ?Regardless of the discipline, IIT
taught us critical thinking skills that have benefited us throughout our careers and our lives,? said Kopan.
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