Like most Americans during the Eisenhower age, the
Stallman family spent the 50s trying to recapture the
normalcy lost during the wartime years of the 1940s.
"Richard's father and I were Democrats but happy enough
to leave it at that," says Lippman, recalling the
family's years in Queens. "We didn't get involved much
in local or national politics."
That all began to change, however, in the late 1950s
when Alice divorced Daniel Stallman. The move back to
Manhattan represented more than a change of address; it
represented a new, independent identity and a jarring
loss of tranquility.
"I think my first taste of political activism came when
I went to the Queens public library and discovered
there was only a single book on divorce in the whole
library," recalls Lippman. "It was very controlled by
the Catholic church, at least in Elmhurst, where we
lived. I think that was the first inkling I had of the
forces that quietly control our lives."
Returning to her childhood neighborhood, Manhattan's
Upper West Side, Lippman was shocked by the changes
that had taken place since her departure to Hunter
College a decade and a half before.
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