{"id":1043,"date":"2020-09-03T18:23:25","date_gmt":"2020-09-03T18:23:25","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.hiremaster.com\/trucking-news\/?p=1043"},"modified":"2020-09-03T18:28:13","modified_gmt":"2020-09-03T18:28:13","slug":"driving-into-history","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.hiremaster.com\/trucking-news\/other-news\/2020\/09\/03\/driving-into-history\/1043\/","title":{"rendered":"Driving Into History"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

4 Women Drivers Take Part in Historic Convoy to Recognize the Anniversary of First Women\u2019s Vote<\/em><\/h4>\n\n\n\n
By AL MUSKEWITZ<\/strong><\/h5>\n\n\n\n

Four pioneering women in the American trucking industry are paying tribute and bringing awareness to another pioneering woman in the nation\u2019s history by participating in a cross-country drive to celebrate the 150th<\/sup> anniversary of the first woman to vote in America.

April Coolidge, a driver with Walmart Logistics, jumps in the truck later today in Denver to start the anchor leg of a 1,750-mile journey that began in Baltimore Aug. 31 and will end in Laramie, Wyo. Sept. 6, the anniversary of Louisa Swain casting America\u2019s first vote in a general election by a woman in 1870.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI\u2019m just honored to be included in this and recognizing Louisa Swain for the historic moment she had casting the first vote representing women,\u201d Coolidge said as she awaited her flight in the Charlotte, N.C., airport to meet the truck. \u201cIt is very meaningful to me. Louisa Swain was the first woman who ever cast a vote representing women in the election process.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI look at that and compare it to what myself the other women do on the (America\u2019s) Road Team, representing women in the trucking industry. We\u2019re kind of a pioneer in what we do because there are not a lot of women in the trucking industry so we\u2019re kind of paving a path for women and being an example for women to get involved in the trucking industry, to show them they have opportunities and they can accomplish whatever they set their minds out to do.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Coolidge has been joined on the journey by three other accomplished women drivers \u2013 Rhonda Hartman of Old Dominion Freight Lines, Tina Peterson of FedEx Ground and Dee Sova of Prime Inc. They represent nearly 85 years of driving experience and more than 8.5 million safe miles. All four are currently or have been members of the ATA\u2019s America\u2019s Road Team.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"
Meet the four women drivers taking part in the convoy.<\/strong><\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

The specially wrapped ATA truck made stops in Washington, D.C.; Columbus, Ohio; Dayton, Ohio; Indianapolis and St. Louis; and is scheduled for stops in Denver; Cheyenne, Wyo.; and Laramie, culminating with a reenactment of Swain\u2019s historic vote.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Coolidge, a registered voter, admitted she didn\u2019t know much of Swain\u2019s story as the first woman in the world to cast a ballot under democratically enacted laws granting women equal political rights with men before her invitation to take part in the project, but has learned a lot since. Swain was on her way to the market to buy some yeast that historic morning when she passed the polling place and election officials encouraged her to come inside and cast her vote.

Legend has it she beat the next woman in town to vote by some 30 minutes.

\u201cTo be a part of this recognizing her for making history is a pretty big deal to me,\u201d Coolidge said. \u201cIt\u2019s pretty special.\u201d

And the leg of the commemorative convoy she\u2019s driving is pretty special, too.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cBeing from Montana, that is really the leg I enjoy the most,\u201d she said, \u201cbecause it makes me feel like I\u2019m going back home.\u201d

Al Muskewitz is the Editor of Wright Media. He can be reached at musky@wrightmediacorp.com<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

4 Women Drivers Take Part in Historic Convoy to Recognize the Anniversary of First Women\u2019s Vote By AL MUSKEWITZ Four pioneering women in the American trucking industry are paying tribute and bringing awareness to another…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":1045,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[179],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hiremaster.com\/trucking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1043"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hiremaster.com\/trucking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hiremaster.com\/trucking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hiremaster.com\/trucking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hiremaster.com\/trucking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1043"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/www.hiremaster.com\/trucking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1043\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1049,"href":"https:\/\/www.hiremaster.com\/trucking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1043\/revisions\/1049"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hiremaster.com\/trucking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1045"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hiremaster.com\/trucking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1043"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hiremaster.com\/trucking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1043"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hiremaster.com\/trucking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1043"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}