“From Bonnets to Law Briefs,” an orginal performance piece by JOAN MORRIS, tells the stories of early Chicago women lawyers (1860s to 1930s), their struggles to study and practice law in Illinois, and their accomplishments as lawyers.

Two seasoned members of Actors Equity, Brigid Duffy and Alma Washington play, respectively, Myra Bradwell and Violette Anderson. Mary Bonnett takes on the role of Mary Bartelme; Paul Odell acts the role of a judge; and music is performed by Ken Morris.

E. Lynn Grayson, keynote speaker, will speak on the Alliance for Women, one of the largest member organizations of the Chicago Bar Association. Ms. Grayson is a partner in Jenner & Block’s Chicago offices, has an extensive environmental law background, and is past chairperson for the Environmental, Natural Resources and Energy Law Committee of the American Bar Association.

Along with this expertise on environment, Ms. Grayson is past Chair of Jenner & Block’s Women’s Forum, an organization dedicated to fostering professional, social and personal growth opportunities for all women attorneys. She is on the Board of Directors for the National Conference of Women’s Bar Associations and the Coalition of Women’s Initiatives in Law. Ms. Grayson is also the first recipient of the Chicago Bar Association’s Alta May Hulett Award for her contributions to the advancement of women.

Gwen Jordan, honoree, has a doctorate from the University of Illinois at Chicago. While at the University of Illinois at Chicago she researched and wrote for Women Building Chicago 1790-1990: A Biographical Dictionary published in 2001 by Indiana University Press, a project of the Chicago Area Women’s History Council. In 1998 she edited and compiled Bar None: 125 Years of Women Lawyers in Illinois for the Alliance for Women of the Chicago Bar Association. Research from this book plus yet unpublished work of Professor Jordan’s is the basis for our play “From Bonnets to Law Briefs” by Joan Morris.

Currently, Ms. Jordan is a visiting assistant professor at Northern Illinois University in the Department of Sociology. Her scholarly interests center on issues of race, gender, the law, and the legal profession. A current project of hers focuses on the intersection of race and gender within the legal profession. She uses critical race theory to examine the first two black women lawyers in Illinois.

Marisel A. Hernandez, partner at Jacobs, Burns, Orlove, Stanton, & Hernandez, specializes in labor law. Ms. Hernandez represents public and private labor clients, including United Food & Commercial Workers Local 1546 in Chicago, various Amalgamated Transit Union locals, Painters District Council No. 30, the Illinois Federation of Teachers, and the Chicago Teachers' Pension Fund on a variety of issues in state and federal court and before administrative agencies, such as the EEOC and the Illinois Department of Human Rights.

Adisa Krupalija, an associate at Clingen, Callow & McLean, LLC, concentrates her practice in labor and employment and commercial litigation. Her practice involves the representation of corporations, limited liability companies, non-profit organizations and high net-worth individuals. Working pro bono, Ms. Krupalija has dealt with a difficult asylum case for a woman from another country who was being exploited in the United States.

Wendy Pollack, is the founder and director of the Women's Law and Policy Project (WLPP) at the Shriver Center. The WLPP draws on the experiences of women and girls and brings those experiences to the forefront in the Shriver Center's analysis of poverty and the development of solutions to end poverty permanently. Pollack has been working extensively on public benefits and work supports, workforce and economic development, education, employment, family law, violence against women and girls, gender equity in schools, and other issues affecting low-income women and girls, on the local, state, and federal level. Before becoming a lawyer, she was a union carpenter and cofounder of Chicago Women Carpenters in 1979 and Chicago Women in Trades in 1982.