Working Women’s History Project

Connecting Today with Yesterday and Making Women’s History Come Alive

Remembering Helen Marie Ramirez-Odell 

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Amy Laiken

July 22, 1942 to March 22, 2022 

An irrepressible and unstoppable woman of conviction and fighter for what was right and what was fair.

Recently, Working Women’s History Project lost one of our beloved board members — Helen Ramirez-Odell.

Helen, in 1995, was one of our Founding Members of Women and Labor History Project (WLHP), later renamed Working Women’s History Project. 

Helen’s energy seemed unflagging and she was active in numerous organizations that she believed in. She was Vice President of Programming and remained an active board member right up until the very end. But Helen was more than that. She was a woman, wife, mother, grandmother, step-grandmother, step-great-grandmother, activist and friend. 

Before anything else, Helen was Helen, one of a kind: irrepressible and irreplaceable. 

Celebration of Life: Helen Ramirez-Odell

On May 14, 2022, family, friends, and union and social justice colleagues of the late Helen Ramirez-Odell gathered at Chief O’Neill’s Pub to celebrate her life and share stories of her activism in social justice movements. Helen was Working Women’s History Project’s Vice President for Programming.

After lunch, generously provided by Helen Ramirez-Odell’s and Paul Odell’s families, Debby Pope, CTU Class Size Coordinator and member of the executive board, opened the program and mentioned Helen’s involvement in many organizations and causes. She later spoke about the way Helen recognized that race, gender and class are intersectional in the issues affecting people. Others speakers included:

  • State Senator Ram Villivalem, who talked about how he first met Helen, and of a resolution, adopted on April 9th, that he entered into the record of the 102nd State Senate (Senate Resolution 982), in her honor.
  • Jackie Kirley, former president and current board member of Working Women’s History Project, who credited Helen with encouraging her to run for president. She also cited the many ways Helen contributed to WWHP, including writing articles for our newsletters, and donating all the proceeds from the sales of one of her books, Working Without Uniforms: School Nursing In Chicago 1951-2001 to Working Women’s History Project.
  • Katie Jordan, President of the Chicago Chapter of the Coalition of Labor Union Women and board member of WWHP, who described Helen as a “phenomenal woman,” whom she had known for 55 years and had gotten to know better through Helen’s involvement in CLUW.
  • Moira Melendez, Helen’s daughter, and Cyndi Christel, Helen’s stepdaughter, who emphasized Helen’s strong commitments to her family. Moira said that there were many beautiful stories about her mother’s life, and both women said that they viewed each other as sisters. Cyndi spoke about her father (and Helen’s husband), Paul Odell, who passed away in April, and described Helen’s and Paul’s marriage as one of equals.
  • Sue Straus, longtime activist in Chicago NOW and Vice President in Charge of Development for Working Women’s History Project, who spoke of Helen’s involvement in Northwest Suburban NOW and her commitment to the Equal Rights amendment.
  • Stacy Davis Gates, Chicago Teacher’s Union Vice President, who praised Helen as a strong unionist who recognized that women’s rights included reproductive justice as well as fair wages.
  • Mary Ann Johnson, President of Chicago Women’s History Center, who interviewed Helen as part of an oral history project. She read an excerpt from the transcript of the interview, which will follow this article.
  • Professor Rosemary Feurer, of the Mother Jones Heritage Project and Associate Professor of History at Northern Illinois University, who said that Helen beautifully connected the past with the present and that she was pivotal in raising money to erect a statue in honor of Mother Jones.
  • Leah Shoshana played the guitar and she and Kimberly Goldbaum sang songs in solidarity with the women’s and labor movements, while the audience enthusiastically sang along to “Union Maid,” a particular favorite of Helen’s. WWHP treasurer Ken Morris opened the event by playing guitar. Later, Ken and Joan Morris performed the song “Sigh No More” with lyrics by William Shakespeare.

It was an uplifting afternoon, filled with tributes to a woman whose passion for social justice was a calling, and with testimony about the many lives she touched. Those who attended left with the resolve to continue fighting for the causes that Helen championed for so long.

This event was videotaped for CAN TV by Frank Avila, who had worked with Helen on the Mother Jones Chicago Statue Campaign. The video will be aired at a later date.