1899: Illustrator Chas. Gibson introduces the Gibson Girls as the beauty ideal.

1900: Women are included in the Olympics (golf & tennis).

1910: Average female factory worker earns $1.57 per day.

1911: Fire kills 146 women workers at Triangle Shirtwaist in NYC.

1913: Alice Paul and Lucy Burns lead 5,000 suffragists in Washington march for the vote.

1914: Mary Phelps Jacob patents the brassiere, leading to the demise of the corset.

1915: Jeannette Rankin becomes the first woman elected to Congress; Margaret Sanger opens USA's first birth control clinic.

1918: More than 1.4 million women go to work to replace men overseas during WWI.

1920: Nineteenth Amendment ratified giving women the right to vote.

1921: Edith Wharton wins the Pulizter for Age of Innocence.

1926: First female to swim the English Channel, Gertrude Ederle, breaks men's record.

1928: Olympic 800-meter run declared dangerous for women, banned until 1960.

1932: Amelia Earhart flies solo across the Atlantic.

1932: Katherine Hepburn stars in feminist themed Christopher Strong, directed by Dorothy Arzner.

1933: Congress creates WAVES and WACS for non combat military duty.

1938: Hepburn is forced out of RKO pictures for wearing slacks and refusing to do pin-ups.

1940: Nylon stockings go on sale in USA.

1944: "Rosie the Riveters" swell wartime women's workforce to 6 million; gov't sponsors 24-hour daycare for their kids.

1955: Rosa Parks sparks civil rights movement by refusing to go to the back of a Montgomery bus.

1959: Pantyhose introduced.

1960: First birth control pill is sold.

1963: Betty Friedan's The Feminine Mystique begins third wave of feminist movement; Equal Pay Act passes.

1964: Civil Rights Act includes protection for women.

1966: NOW founded with 28 members; issues a manifesto calling for true equality for all women; Pampers diapers introduced by Procter & Gamble.

1969: Williams, Trinity and Vassar colleges go co-ed.

1971: Sally Priesand becomes the first woman ordained as a rabbi in USA.

1972: Ms. Magazine's first issue sells out in 8 days.

1972: Anti-feminist Phyllis Schafly launches STOP ERA to fight the Equal Rights Amendment.

1973: Roe v. Wade guarantees right to abortion.

1975: Title IX guarantees equal educational opportunity; Women admitted to military academies; Billie Jean King kicks Bobby Riggs' butt in tennis "battle of the sexes".

1981: First woman Supreme, Sandra Day O'Connor.

1982: Equal Rights Amendment defeated, lacking 3 states needed for ratification.

1984: Joan Benoit wins first Olympic Women's Marathon.

1990: Norplant introduced.

1993: Family and Medical Leave becomes law.

1997: Women's National Basketball League debuts.

1998: Women surpass men in high school graduation and college degrees.

1999: Women's World Cup soccer draws world record-breaking crowds.

1999: Women earn 74% of men's wages overall.

2000: Women win half the seats in Congress, and the Vice Presidency, leading to first woman Prez in 2004 (well we can dream, can't we?)

Well, it sounds better than crowded airports and cranky people. In any case, we're taking holiday break. Look for WFF January 7, 2000.

SHOP FOR THE HOLIDAYS WITH A CLEAR CONSCIENCE

The National Labor Committee (212-242-3002; www.nlcnet.org) is organizing a nationwide holiday campaign to end child labor and sweatshops, by promoting human rights and dignity over corporate indifference and greed. Shoppers are urged to use their holiday dollars to reward companies moving in the right direction and penalize those who violate human rights. The NLC's list of "greediest" sweatshop abusers of the season: Nike, Wal-Mart, Guess?, Walt Disney Co., Kmart, J.C. Penney, Esprit, Victoria's Secret and May's Department Stores. (Most pay pennies-a-day wages through exploitive contractors producing their merchandise.) NLC is gathering a petition to ask President Clinton to end child labor and sweatshops. Add your signature online at www.uaw.org/special/season2.html

Two Internet sites are designed to provide people who support the work of non-profit organizations a way to help their favorite group while they cyber-shop. Washington Feminist Faxnet is one of the beneficiaries shoppers are able to choose at www.igive.com. You can also find us under Center for Advancement of Public Policy at www.shop2give.com. Gift certificates and merchandise can be selected from national vendors like Barnes & Noble, eToys, and J. Crew. Part of the purchase price (2-15%) goes to the group. It costs you nothing, and it's a good way to support WFF (and a variety of other women's groups) while shopping online.

Thanks to WFF readers and other activists who called and faxed the White House and Secretary of State Madeleine Albright after the Administration horse-traded restrictions on international planning groups for payment of U.N. dues (WFF 11/19). Albright met with women's groups and announced a huge increase in the request for next year's funds. President Clinton signed a waiver of the restrictions this week as promised, and vowed to wipe out the onerous provisions altogether next year.

Despite letters and faxes from women around the world, women in Kuwait have been denied the vote (WFF 11/12). They'll try again with Parliament next year.