Glass Half-Broken

 

REACHING FOR THE TOP

The Honorable Barbara Hackman Franklin

In the 1950s, college-educated women had few options for pursuing a professional life—and those who did were expected to leave their jobs behind when they married. Barbara Franklin intended to carve a different path. She recalls, “I’m not sure I could have defined what success was—but I knew I wanted a career.” Encouraged by a father who said “You can do anything you want, but do it well,” Franklin set off for college at Penn State with high, if slightly hazy, aspirations. (“I think my mother never really approved of the whole idea,” she notes.)

A trailblazing path did unfold, as did a long-running habit of making her way into places that were the traditional province of men. In ...