Shevy Healey

Shevy Healey
A young woman with light skin and dark curly hair, wearing a dark top and strands of pearls or beads
Evelyn Finkel, later known as Shevy Healey, from the 1938 yearbook of the Philadelphia High School for Girls
Born
Sewera Finkel

January 29, 1922
Poland
DiedDecember 8, 2001 (aged 79)
NationalityAmerican
Other namesEvaline Finkel, Evelyn Finkel, Shevy Wallace
Occupation(s)Psychologist, labor organizer, activist

Shevy Evelyn Wallace Healey (January 29, 1922[1] – December 8, 2001) born Sewera Finkel,[2] was an American clinical psychologist, labor organizer, sleep researcher, and activist. She was a founding member of Old Lesbians Organizing for Change (OLOC).

Early life and education

Healey was born in Poland and raised in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, the daughter of Rose Spiegel Feldman.[1][3] Her family was Jewish. She recalled her birth name being changed to "Evelyn" when she enrolled in an American kindergarten.[4] She graduated from the Philadelphia High School for Girls in 1938.[5] In 1976, she completed doctoral studies in psychology at Ohio State University, with a dissertation titled "The onset of chronic insomnia and the role of life-stress events".[6]

Career

Healey was a labor organizer in the 1940s, working for the Congress of International Organizations (CIO) in Los Angeles. She was a member of the Communist Party[7] and of the NAACP of Los Angeles.[8] She testified at the Tenney Committee hearing in 1946.[9]

In the 1970s, Healey was a sleep researcher at the University of California, Los Angeles.[10] In the 1980s, she was a clinical psychologist.[11]

Healey was a founding member of Old Lesbians Organizing for Change (OLOC).[12][13] "We name and proclaim ourselves as 'old'", she declared at the group's first West Coast conference in 1987. "We no longer wish to collude in our own oppression by accommodating to language that implies in any way that 'old' means inferior, ugly, or awful."[14] In 1988, she appeared in Acting Our Age, a PBS documentary about women and aging.[15][16] In 1992, she spoke at a conference on aging in the LGBT community.[17] In 1998, she was a featured speaker at another national conference on aging issues in the LGBT community, at Fordham University.[18] Arden Eversmeyer interviewed Healey for the Old Lesbian Oral Herstory Project.[19] She appeared in the documentary No Secret Anymore: The Times of Del Martin & Phyllis Lyon (2003).

Publications

Sleep research

  • "Personality Patterns in Insomnia: Theoretical Implications" (1976, with A. Kales, A. B. Caldwell, T. A. Preston, and J. D. Kales)[20]
  • "Prevalence of sleep disorders in the Los Angeles metropolitan area" (1979, with E. O. Bixler, A. Kales, C. R. Soldatos, and J. D. Kales)[21]
  • "Onset of Insomnia: Role of Life-Stress Events" (1981, with A. Kales, L. J. Moroe, E. O. Bixler, K. Chamberlin, and C. R. Soldatos)[22]

Age, Disability, and Sexuality

  • "Growing to be an old woman: Aging and ageism" (1986)[23]
  • "An Unbreakable Circle of Women: Can We Create It? Age—Segregation, Privilege and the Politics of Inclusion" (1991)[24]
  • "NLC: Old Lesbians" (1991)[25]
  • "The Common Agenda Between Old Women, Women with Disabilities and All Women" (1993)[26]
  • "Confronting Ageism: A Must for Mental Health" (1993)[27]
  • "Diversity with a Difference: On Being Old and Lesbian" (1994)[28]
  • "Growing to be an Old Woman: Aging and Ageism" (1994)[29]
  • "RV Life Begins at Seventy" (1996)[30][31]
  • "One Old Lesbian's Perspective" (1999)[4]
  • "Ageism in OOB" (2000)[32]

Personal life

Finkel married twice, to Floyd L. Wallace in 1942, and to Don R. Healey, who was also once married to Dorothy Ray Healey. She had a daughter, Donna. Healey came out as a lesbian when she was 50.[16] She died in 2001, at the age of 79. There is a box of her papers in the collection of the Southern California Library for Social Studies and Research.[7]

References

  1. ^ a b The U.S., Social Security Applications and Claims Index, 1936-2007, gives Healey's birth year as 1920, and her birth place as Poland, and her parents names as Israel Finkel and Rose Spiegel; via Ancestry.
  2. ^ Her name was given as Sewera Finkel in the New York, U.S., Arriving Passenger and Crew Lists (including Castle Garden and Ellis Island), 1820-1957; the same record shows her arriving as an infant born in Mikolajor, traveling from Lviv via Cherbourg, arriving in New York on 21 September 1923, on the Beregaria; via Ancestry.
  3. ^ "Feldman, Rose (death notice)". The Los Angeles Times. August 4, 1985. p. 80. Retrieved June 1, 2024 – via Newspapers.com.
  4. ^ a b This is what lesbian looks like: Dyke activists take on the 21st century. Internet Archive. Ithaca, N.Y. : Firebrand Books. 1999. p. 116. ISBN 978-1-56341-116-8.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: others (link)
  5. ^ The Philadelphia High School for Girls, Milestone (1938 yearbook): n.p. via Ancestry. Includes a photo of Evelyn Finkel, and notes that her nickname is Shevy.
  6. ^ Healey, Evelyn Shevy (1976). The onset of chronic insomnia and the role of life-stress events / (Thesis). The Ohio State University.
  7. ^ a b "Shevy Wallace Healey Papers (CIO Los Angeles Organizing), 1938-1962". Online Archive of California. Retrieved June 1, 2024.
  8. ^ FOIA: ACLU Los Angeles 9.
  9. ^ Mrs. Shevy Wallace testifies, Tenney Committee, Los Angeles Herald Examiner Photo Collection: Calisphere, 1946, retrieved June 1, 2024
  10. ^ Fogg, Susan (October 13, 1976). "Conflict Disrupts Sleep". Fort Worth Star-Telegram. p. 65. Retrieved June 1, 2024 – via Newspapers.com.
  11. ^ Pober, Madeline (November 19, 1983). "Mothers and Daughters; The Eternal Love-Hate Relationship". The Sentinel. p. 34. Retrieved June 1, 2024 – via Newspapers.com.
  12. ^ Zimmerman, Bonnie; Haggerty, George (June 13, 2021). Encyclopedia of Lesbian and Gay Histories and Cultures. Routledge. p. xxix, 18. ISBN 978-1-135-72870-0.
  13. ^ Hill, Marcia; Ballou, Mary (April 3, 2013). The Foundation and Future of Feminist Therapy. Routledge. ISBN 978-1-136-37599-6.
  14. ^ Price, Deb (June 4, 1996). "Gray gays offer new insights". The Ithaca Journal. p. 9. Retrieved June 1, 2024 – via Newspapers.com.
  15. ^ Boynton, Suzanne (April 19, 1988). "Older women get on with their lives". The Press Democrat. p. 25. Retrieved June 1, 2024 – via Newspapers.com.
  16. ^ a b Morrison, Bill (July 3, 1988). "Television with a point of view". The News and Observer. p. 74. Retrieved June 1, 2024 – via Newspapers.com.
  17. ^ Shaw, Marv (July 2, 1992). "Diversity with a Difference: Focus on Aging Community". Bay Area Reporter. p. 9 – via California Digital Newspaper Collection.
  18. ^ "Elder Gays and Lesbians Organizing for Change". Seattle Gay News. April 3, 1998. p. 10. Retrieved June 1, 2024 – via Newspapers.com.
  19. ^ "Shevy Healey interviewed by Arden Eversmeyer". Smith College Finding Aids. Retrieved June 1, 2024.
  20. ^ Kales, Anthony (September 1, 1976). "Personality Patterns in Insomnia: Theoretical Implications". Archives of General Psychiatry. 33 (9): 1128–24. doi:10.1001/archpsyc.1976.01770090118013. ISSN 0003-990X. PMID 962495.
  21. ^ Bixler, E. O.; Kales, A.; Soldatos, C. R.; Kales, J. D.; Healey, S. (October 1979). "Prevalence of sleep disorders in the Los Angeles metropolitan area". American Journal of Psychiatry. 136 (10): 1257–1262. doi:10.1176/ajp.136.10.1257. ISSN 0002-953X. PMID 314756.
  22. ^ Healey, Shevy E.; Kales, Anthony; Monroe, Lawrence J.; Bixler, Edward O.; Chamberlin, Katherine; Soldatos, Constantin R. (October 1981). "Onset of Insomnia: Role of Life-Stress Events1". Psychosomatic Medicine. 43 (5): 439–451. doi:10.1097/00006842-198110000-00007. ISSN 0033-3174. PMID 7313035.
  23. ^ Healey, Shevy. "Growing to be an old woman: Aging and ageism." Women and aging: An anthology by women (1986): 58-62.
  24. ^ Healey, S. (1991). An Unbreakable Circle of Women: Can We Create It? Age—Segregation, Privilege and the Politics of Inclusion. Off Our Backs, 21(6), 10-13.
  25. ^ Healey, Shevy (1991). "NLC — old lesbians". Off Our Backs. 21 (8): 26. ISSN 0030-0071. JSTOR 20833735.
  26. ^ Healey, Shevy (1993), "The Common Agenda Between Old Women, Women with Disabilities and All Women", Women With Disabilities, Routledge, doi:10.4324/9781315863818-8/common-agenda-old-women-women-disabilities-women-shevy-healey (inactive November 1, 2024), ISBN 978-1-315-86381-8, retrieved June 1, 2024{{citation}}: CS1 maint: DOI inactive as of November 2024 (link)
  27. ^ Healey, Shevy (1993), "Confronting Ageism: A MUST for Mental Health", Faces of Women and Aging, Routledge, doi:10.4324/9781315801247-6/confronting-ageism-must-mental-health-shevy-healey (inactive November 1, 2024), ISBN 978-1-315-80124-7, retrieved June 1, 2024{{citation}}: CS1 maint: DOI inactive as of November 2024 (link)
  28. ^ Healey, Shevy (February 10, 1994). "Diversity with a Difference:: On Being Old and Lesbian". Journal of Gay & Lesbian Social Services. 1 (1): 109–118. doi:10.1300/J041v01n01_08. ISSN 1053-8720.
  29. ^ Stoller, Eleanor Palo (1994). Worlds of difference : inequality in the aging experience. Internet Archive. Thousand Oaks, Calif. : Pine Forge Press. p. 81. ISBN 978-0-8039-9030-2.
  30. ^ Nance, Kevin (January 14, 1996). "Lesbian essayists celebrate distinct perceptions of life". Lexington Herald-Leader. p. 62. Retrieved June 1, 2024 – via Newspapers.com.
  31. ^ Jay, Karla (1995). Dyke life : from growing up to growing old, a celebration of the lesbian experience. Internet Archive. New York : Basic Books. p. 87. ISBN 978-0-465-03907-4.
  32. ^ healey, shevy (2000). "ageism in oob". Off Our Backs. 30 (5): 17. ISSN 0030-0071. JSTOR 20836621.