Katrina 20 Years Later

Twenty years ago, Hurricane Katrina reshaped Louisiana, physically, emotionally, and politically. Aswe reflect on its impact today, we also honor the resilience of the Louisiana Federation of Business and Professional Women and the women who rose to rebuild, lead, and advocate for lasting change.

In June 2005, I was installed as State President of BPW/Louisiana with a clear vision and a call to action anchored by our theme: BPW/LA Gems are “RARE.” A path to refocusing on BPW/USA’s mission to help women achieve work-life balance and workplace equity:

• Activate our membership to engage with policymakers and drive systemic change
• Renew our dedication to supporting this mission through every challenge
• Execute a strategic plan aligned with our values and vision

My term as President began with a tremendous trip to Philadelphia. Energized and focused, we were able to respond swiftly and effectively to the concerns of our Local Organizations.

In August, I began my tour of all our Local Organizations. I was warmly welcomed by the Northwest Louisiana and Natchitoches Locals. In Natchitoches, President Theresa Gibson and I visited with then-Mayor Wayne McCullen, (a BPW member) who honored me with the keys to the city.

Then came Baton Rouge for the Women’s Equality Day Summit at the LSU Women’s Center in celebration of the 85th Anniversary of the Passage of the 19th Amendment. Immediate Past State President and ERA Chair Camille Moran and her dedicated committee delivered an outstanding program that honored our shared legacy and ongoing advocacy.

This was just days before the storm hit.

The chaos and heartbreak that swept across Louisiana were unlike anything we had ever faced. Yet our resilience shone through.

As soon as conditions allowed, members of the Board of Directors from North and Central Louisiana convened at my home to discuss how we could best help our sisters in the hardest hit areas.

We checked on members all over the state and learned that some had evacuated north. Past President Cynthia Edwards (New Orleans) and her husband Gilbert, stayed briefly at a hotel in West Monroe, while Martha Gremillion (New Orleans) found refuge in Bastrop with her niece.

The outpouring of support from BPW clubs across the country was deeply moving. BPW Arizona adopted a New Orleans member and provided personal assistance throughout her recovery.

BPW Virginia contributed the largest monetary donation, an extraordinary gesture of solidarity.

While we were not able to execute the strategic plan we’d envisioned, we stood strong for the Southeast when they needed us most. That, to me, is the true measure of leadership: being present, being compassionate, and rising to meet the moment.

This is the heart of NFBPWC.

Despite the ravages of Katrina and later Rita, we were still able to host the Mid-Year Board Meeting in Lafayette on January 13,

2006, where members from the areas hardest hit by Katrina and Rita shared their stories of recovery and the locations of some of our members who had moved out of state to be with relatives until they could return home. Of course, many had no homes to return to. In addition, Joe Berry, a Louisiana Professional Lobbyist spoke at the Legislative luncheon.

In March, Roslyn Ridgeway (GA) visited Louisiana in her capacity as BPW/USA National President. She was hosted by clubs in St. Bernard Parish, Slidell, and West St. Tammany, and met with members in Mandeville.

Our Clubs in Metairie-Kenner, New Orleans, and Lafitte came together to host a reception at a local recreation center, creating a rare space for healing and reconnection amid the devastation.

In April, we gathered to observe Equal Pay Day – a joint venture with the Louisiana ERA Coalition – at which State Representative Sydnie Mae M. Durand of Louisiana District 46 gave the keynote address before Representative Willie Hunter, author of HB144 Louisiana Equal Pay for Women Act, led an advocacy training.

On May 20th, Immediate Past State President, Camille Moran officially presented the Northwest Louisiana Local Organization with their charter. This represents a flowering of the seeds NFBPWC’s members in Louisianna and throughout the country planted together during and after the hurricanes, and is further proof that, as an organization, we are resilient, and we remain Rooted in Purpose – Rising in Power.

By Angie Jackson-Wilson, Louisianna State President 2005-2006

---

Women on the Move

Eva Richter Finds Her Way Home

A Review of SEEKING HOME: A World War II Refugee Childhood in War-torn China. We first meet Eva on Empire Day, May 24, 1937. She is four years old and knows she is not meant to be where she is. Her father has just handed her over the fence to sit with her aunt in the bleachers to see the celebration on a huge movie screen. She’s trying to be inconspicuous. She is in Tientsin, China, in the British Compound, celebrating the coronations of King George IV and Queen Elizabeth.

She does not belong there because she is not a British subject. She and her parents fled Germany when she was two and they are stateless – a difficult and potentially dangerous status any time, but more so in this particular time and place.

Eva is a precocious child. She is naturally intelligent and inquisitive – often causing consternation at school by questioning the received wisdom as set forth by her teachers. The fact that she was usually right endeared her to no one but her loving parents. Having spent her life as a refugee seems to have heightened her need to understand things, to belong, and to be aware of her surroundings in a way that most children, even adolescents and teens, are not.

That’s a good thing for her – and a great thing for us. As clear as it is that adult Eva did some research on specific dates and names and political intrigues, it is equally clear that she has an astonishing recall of the events of her childhood – a childhood that she said seemed utterly unremarkable as she was living it, as most childhoods do, yet continues to elicit incredulity whenever she speaks of it. She wrote this book in response to those responses, and because her children and grandchildren begged her to. I’m not giving anything away to tell you that we follow Eva and her brilliant and compassionate parents through the complex life of foreigners living in China under both Chinese and Japanese rule, then making it to the end of the war and not finding what they’d anticipated when the smoke cleared.

They moved to America, and, eventually, Eva joined BPW.

As we travel through time with the Lewison family, we receive a brief history of local and world events along the  way.  After background on Eva’s   maternal and paternal families, we get a crash course the history of Tientsin and what it was like to live there during the days when Britian, Italy, and several other nations had their own concessions – large areas that operated as their own independent fiefdoms, accountable to the laws of their own home nations, and occupied only by citizens.

With Eva as a guide, we go to markets, attend numerous schools of varying pedagogies and qualities, experience the attack on Pearl Harbor from a different perspective, make it through the Japanese occupation, witness the condescension and racism inherent in the lives and actions of foreign nationals toward their Chinese hosts, make and lose friends, move to America and discover that the streets are not all paved with gold and there are poor and hungry disenfranchised people there too.

Throughout, Eva is a charming companion who faces difficulties with a pragmatic approach and a stiff upper lip – for most of her youth she is, in her heart, a British subject. The reader is occasionally much more worried about her than she is. She is such a straight- forward child, so sure that right will prevail and that she can manage things just fine, thank you.

When she leaves us, she is an American citizen, making a life for herself and her own family, and we are sure she, and they, are indeed going to be just fine, thank you.

Both articles by Lisa Dicksteen

Bloomsbury Academic, 2025, 223 pages.

To purchase go to Bloomsbury Academic,Amazon, or Barnes & Nobel

A

Virtual Lunch with Eva Richter: Woman on the Move and Author of “Seeking Home”

September 27, 2025: As part of Women on the Move’s ongoing effort to spotlight NFBPW’s fascinating and far-flung

Forty-two people were riveted as Eva talked about why she wrote the book (her children and grandchildren basically insisted), what it was like (she enjoyed reminiscing and is grateful for the internet and its endless source of fact-checking and images and to her Prussian father and his meticulous record keeping), and how surprised she has been by the interest of so many people outside her family and friends.

Among the attendees were her family, members and non-members of NFBPWC, and at least two old friends. Zhidong Hao was Eva’s student in the 1980s when Eva returned to China to teach. She sponsored his admission to the US to pursue a PhD and they have remained friends. He translated the book into Chinese for release in Taiwan early next year and is negotiating with mainland publishers for its release there.

Zohal Wali credits Eva as her mentor when they were in Afghanistan and asked for her advice for young refugees just getting used to a new country and culture. Eva said her advice is the same for everyone – native or new to the US – listen. Listen to everyone you meet to discover the similarities between your cultures as well as to understand the differences.

There were attendees zooming in from Alberta, California, Colorado, Germany, Italy, Montreal, Morocco, New Jersey, New York City, New York State, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, Seattle, Singapore, and Tucson, and more, and everyone was shocked when 90 minutes had passed and it was time to stop.