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Crystal Eastman Benedict, circa 1913.
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Formal portrait, three-quarter-length, seated, Crystal Eastman Benedict, facing left with upper body and head turned toward camera, wearing square-necked blouse cinched at waist with tasseled-rope belt, watch on left wrist, and necklace.

Credit: Library of Congress

Crystal Eastman had just graduated from New York University Law School when she was called to work on the Pittsburgh Survey. After investigating labor conditions in Pittsburgh, Eastman moved to New York where she helped draft the nation’s first worker compensation law. She then campaigned against World War I, fought for women’s suffrage, immersed herself in the feminist movement, and was a founding board member of the American Civil Liberties Union. Eastman died in Erie, PA, in 1928 at the age of 47.

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