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Session:         Page of 592

International Congresses of Women. In every case, they're very widely distributed.

Q:

Roughly how many altogether were printed?

Foner:

Well, in each case we would start with an initial run of 5,000. Then we'd have to go back to press. I would say that the number of actual posters would be in the neighborhood of 50,000 posters.

Q:

Series? Fifty thousand series of posters?

Foner:

Fifty thousand series.

Q:

Yes, of twelve each.

Foner:

Of twelve each.

Q:

And you sold them for how much a series, a set?

Foner:

We sold them for -- the set was, I think, $12.95. It was ridiculous. You know, we were trying to get them around. Oh, no, no, it was $39.95. I'm sorry, $39.95, and we sold --

Q:

And what were the dimensions of them? They were a fairly good size.

Foner:

Eighteen by twenty-four in full color, very well printed, and it became known that we were doing it. I even got a grant from the Morgan Foundation because I sent her a copy of letters that we received from students who had seen it, and asked her if she would help support continuing to get them up on the subways, and they did.

We got the most wonderful letters from students. I remember one very, very specifically. This woman wrote, she said, “I want to apologize. Last night as I was going home, I saw the poster of Toni Morrison. Toni Morrison is my idol. I stayed on the train until the last stop, then when everybody got off, I took the poster out and took it home. So now I have it. Thank you.”

We would get just scores of letters from people. So that's the posters.

Q:

Where did you get the idea for a poster series? You told where you got the idea for African-American women.

Foner:

Well, the idea of posters came to me much earlier. When I came to 1199, one of the positions I had -- you know, it's a drugstore union, and I came from 65, which is a larger union, and they wanted me to put out the magazine, which I knew nothing about, do social,





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