In Memoriam: Rosalyn Fraad Baxandall, 1939-2015

Rosalyn Baxandall, the feminist historian and long-time educator, died on October 13 in New York City. She was 76 years old and had suffered from kidney cancer.

Baxandall was born in New York City. Both of her parents were member of the Communist Party. After graduating from Hunter High School, she enrolled at Smith College in Northampton, Massachusetts. After her first year, Baxandall transferred to the University of Wisconsin, where she earned a bachelor’s degree in French. She later earned a master’s degree at the School of Social Work of Columbia University.

Baxandall became active in the women’s movement and the civil rights movement. She joined the faculty in the American studies department at the State University of New York at Old Westbury in 1971. She remained on the faculty there until 2012. Later, she taught in the labor studies program at the City University of New York.

Baxandall was the author of Words on Fire: The Life and Writing of Elizabeth Gurley Flynn (Rutgers University Press, 1987). She was co-editor of textbook America’s Working Women: A Documentary History, 1600 to the Present (Random House, 1976).