By Lois Sterba
No one knows more than teachers how important it is to follow rules. But sometimes the rules need to be changed. This is a story of just one of those times.
Meryl Althea Russell was born in Harvey Illinois in 1904. Having attended the University of Illinois, Northwestern and the University of Wisconsin, she was very qualified as a teacher. By 1940 she was teaching physical education at Morton High School in Cicero, Illinois. There she met Charles H. Haberman and on May 7, 1943, they were married. The teacher’s contract she signed in 1940 had the provision that if a female teacher married she would have to resign. However, during the war years when many men were in service, the provision was waved. Once the war ended, the Morton High School school district advised Meryl and four other female teachers they would be fired because they were married. The school district felt the teaching jobs should now be given to men returning from the war. Many school districts still had the no-marriage clause that originated in the 1800s.
Meryl and the others who were fired felt it was very unfair and they wanted to do something to change this rule. The teachers sued with the help of the American Federation of Teachers. Since Meryl and her husband were living at 1644 Warren Avenue in Downers Grove she applied for a job at Downers Grove High School. Downers Grove no longer had the no-marriage clause in their teacher’s contracts. She was hired as a P.E. teacher in Downers Grove in 1948 but still pursued her lawsuit to change the no-marriage clause in districts that still had it. The legal battle went on until the mid-1950s and went all the way to the Illinois Supreme Court. Because of her fight, the case influenced legislation leading to a change in the Illinois School Code to rule out marriage as a cause for a female teacher to be dismissed. It took a long time but the no-marriage rule is now a thing of the past.
Meryl taught for some years at Downers Grove High before retiring and moving to Florida. She passed away in 1994. The rule she helped change lives on after her.
Sources
- “Five Teachers Sue Board for Job,” Aug 15, 1946, p.1,2, Berwyn Life
- “1946: When gaining a husband meant losing a school job,” Feb 26, 1984, p. 148, Chicago Tribune
- “Meryl A Haberman (obituary),” Feb 27, 1994, p.106, The Tampa Tribune
- “Florida Death Index, 1877-1998,” , FamilySearch (https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:VVHY-LN2 : 25 December 2014), Meryl Althea Haberman, 22 Feb 1994; from “Florida Death Index, 1877-1998,” index, Ancestry (www.ancestry.com : 2004); citing vol. , certificate number 28355,
- Florida Department of Health, Office of Vital Records, Jacksonville.
“Illinois, Cook County Birth Registers, 1871-1915”, , FamilySearch (https://www.familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:N7QX-FQH : Tue Jan 09 21:21:58 UTC 2024), Entry for Meryle A Russell and C.B Russell, 26 Nov 1904.
