Esther Peterson Info Page

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--From the Biography Center Section of the Nat'l Women's History Project Website

"We have a tremendous responsibility to future generations to leave an accurate record of our history, one which lays bare not only the facts, but the process of change."

Esther Peterson was a leading activist in the labor, women's, and consumer movements for more than half a century. She relished her roles as labor educator, lobbyist, government official, corporate executive, and always as an advocate for working women and men.

The fifth of six children born to Danish and pioneer immigrants in Provo, Utah, she was raised in a Mormon household. Her father, Luther Eggersten, was superintendent of schools for Utah and ran the family farm. Education was encouraged by her father who read aloud from Balzac, Thoreau, and Greek philosophers as the family sat around the dining table making rugs.

In 1918 she witnessed the Utah railroad strike. It was her first experience of the anger, confusion, and unrest of a labor conflict. It was a memory that would haunt her until the end of her life. She would never cross a picket line again.

She graduated from Brigham Young in 1927 with a degree in physical education. She met her husband, Oliver, at Columbia University in New York where she obtained her Master's Degree from the Teachers' College. Oliver was active in the Farmer-Labor and Socialist Parties and introduced Esther to an expanded view of America. Esther became very interested in the rights of working people.

From about 1932 to 1937 Esther taught at the Winsor School for Girls in Boston. At night she volunteered to teach classes at the Boston YWCA for domestic workers and those in the garment trades. Each summer she worked as recreation director for the Bryn Mawr Summer School for Women Workers in Industry, where women learned techniques of speaking and organizing, as well as science, literature, history, art, and dance. During this time her first two children, Karen and Eric, were born.

In 1938, Peterson became a union organizer for the American Federation of Teachers. The next year, the family moved to New York and Esther became the assistant director of the Department of Cultural Activities of the Amalgamated Clothing Workers of America.

After World War II began, Esther co-directed the ACWA Committee on War Activities. She also organized other non-union workers, trying especially to integrate the newly hired African American women into the union. In 1942, their third child, Iver, was born.

Peterson began lobbying in 1944, as the union's first legislative representative. She worked to raise minimum wage, and also campaigned for Roosevelt and Truman. Her fourth child, Lars, was born in 1946. Two years later, when Oliver became labor attaché to the U. S. Embassy in Sweden, the family joined him. This gave Esther the opportunity to attend many international meetings and to work with European women trade union leaders.

The family moved back to the U. S. in 1958 and Esther, with her husband ill with cancer, became a lobbyist for the Industrial Union Department of the AFL-CIO. In 1961, President Kennedy appointed her Assistant Secretary of Labor and Director of the Women's Bureau. Among her many achievements was leading the successful campaign for equal pay for equal work legislation and directing the first President's Commission on the Status of Women.

Esther was a leader in both the public and private sectors. As Special Assistant for Consumer Affairs under Presidents Johnson and Carter, she successfully secured such milestones as the truth in packaging legislation. Out of government, she served as Vice President for Consumer Affairs at Giant Food Corporation, and president of the National Consumers League.

She was award the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 1981, the United State's highest civilian award. In 1993, at the age of 87, President Clinton named her as a delegate to the U. N. General Assembly where she continued to be a representative to UNESCO, a visionary advocate for the needs of working Americans.