Geneva Film Festival :: Mother Jones: America’s Most Dangerous Woman

2007 – 1 “Mother Jones: America’s Most Dangerous Woman”
Documentary Film
Laura Vazquez and Rosemary Feurer of Northern Illinois University

Rosemary Feurer is an Associate Professor of History at Northern Illinois University. She is the author of Radical Unionism in the Midwest, 1900-1950 (University of Illinois Press, Working Class in American History Series, 2006) which won the Wentworth Prize for best book in American History in 2007. Her research and teaching focuses on the history of labor, U.S. radicalism and social protest movements and the repression of these movements.

She has experience in connecting the academic study of workers to public history projects, employing a variety of sources and presentation, including tours, electronic media, oral history and video production. As a labor activist in the 1990s, she founded and produced the cable TV show LaborVision in St. Louis, as well as an award-winning 1995 documentary Struggle in the Heartland, concerning the Decatur, Illinois fight against the global conglomerate's effort to institute rotating shifts and 12 hour work days. With Laura Vazquez she is currently working on a documentary about the mine conflict in 1898 in Illinois, "Remember Virden"

Feurer is an Associate Professor of History at Northern Illinois University. She is the author of Radical Unionism in the Midwest, 1900-1950 (2006) which won the Wentworth Prize for best book in American History in 2007. Her research and teaching focuses on the history of labor, U.S. radicalism and social protest movements and the repression of these movements. She has experience in connecting the academic study of workers to public history projects, employing a variety of sources and presentation, including tours, electronic media, oral history and video production. She produced the cable TV show LaborVision in St. Louis, as well as an award-winning 1995 documentary Struggle in the Heartland. With Laura Vazquez she is currently working on a documentary about the mine conflict in 1898 in Illinois, "Remember Virden"

Laura Vazquez is an Associate Professor in the Department of Communication at Northern Illinois

University, DeKalb, Illinois, where she teaches media theory and production courses. Vazquez completed her Ph.D. in Radio/TV/Film at Northwestern University. Her research interests focus on documentary film theory and practice. She is currently working on a documentary with labor historian Dr. Rosemary Feuer on violent mine strike that occurred in Virden, IL at the end of the 19th century. This project is entitled Remember Virden: October 12, 1898 and is funded by a grant from Illinois Humanities Council with additional support from The Mother Jones Foundation.

Vazquez is also working on a documentary with Professor Deborah Robertson from the NIU School of Theatre and Dance on movement techniques created by Loyd Williamson. This project is funded by a Research and Artistry grant from the Graduate School of Northern Illinois University. In January 2008, she will be on sabbatical to complete a feature length documentary on homeless children in the US. In the summer of 2006, she took six students from NIU to Los Angeles to work on a film produced by alumnus, Robert Katz. The film entitled Slipstream was written and directed by Anthony Hopkins who also starred in it.

Her recently completed project entitled Lockout 484 recently screened at the 5 th Annual Reel Work. May Day Labor Film Festival, Santa Cruz County, CA. Lockout 484 documents the labor issues facing workers in Meredosia, IL who were locked out of their jobs after their plant was taken over by a new company. The documentary has been shown widely throughout the midwest on Cable TV channels such as CAN-TV in Chicago and Channel 4 in Springfield, IL. It was also used by workers to raise public awareness of their plight. Her previous documentary project, Ruth Weisberg: On the Journey, 2004 (39 min.) explores the dynamic breadth of Weisberg's art. Vazquez's camera captures Weisberg working in her studio where she discusses her artistic processes. Through the lens of her most recently commissioned work, The Open Door Haggadah, viewers explore her relationship to Judaism and feminism. This documentary reflects the subtlety and exquisite mastery of Weisberg's art which takes us backwards in history and forwards in time. This documentary received a Gold Aurora Award in 2003.

Vazquez supervised the post-production for DeKalb Stories (Dir. Jeffrey Chown, 2001) a 60 min. video on community history and ethnography. She was cinematographer/editor for Lincoln and Black Hawk, a film directed by Chown for the Illinois Humanities Council which has been screened on WTTW, Channel 11 in Chicago. She is also co-directing a documentary on the campus unrest at Northern Illinois University in May of 1970 for which she received a grant from the DeKalb Community Foundation.