History: Helen Moss/Akron City Club 1974-77

Helen Moss, one of the first women members of the club, is now a financial consultant and Vice President of Merrill Lynch in Cleveland. In 1992, she had these remarks on her experience: In 1974, across the country there was a deep recession hitting the downtowns of major cities with much of the business social life leaving the inner cities and going to the suburbs. Simultaneously, there was the emergence of the first women entering the business world. Women as doctors, lawyers, CPAs in major accounting firms, and other traditionally male professions were invisible.

Needless to say, that also included women in any major corporations. There were also very few women entrepreneurs or owners of small businesses. Those women who owned small businesses usually inherited them or worked with relatives. These few women usually kept a low profile even though many of them were extremely good at running their businesses.

"Low Profile" was the unspoken rule which these women never broke. However, the feminists, who paved the way for talented women in business and professions seen everywhere today broke the "Low Profile" rule and blasted open many doors. Some of these doors were legal but most of them were symbolic.

It is at this juncture in the history that the Akron City Club and I first became involved. My involvement with the City Club, however, was not symbolic.

In 1975, Merrill Lynch lost an Equal Opportunity suit, not because they were the only brokerage firm discriminating against women in their sales force, but because they were the biggest target. Consequently, they had to hire a certain number of women. I had wanted to become a broker since 1971, and none of the firms would hire me. However, when I read in the paper that Merrill Lynch was no hiring women as brokers, I applied and got the job.

I did not go from the secretarial pool to broker. I came into the job through the front door as an educated, ambitious woman who believes it impossible not to succeed given the fact that I had four children to support. I kept it no secret from the brokerage sales force that I would succeed. That male sales force saw me work 12 hours a day, plus weekends. Brokers by nature do not like their competition, but a woman who might "make it" in the business and acted as if it were inevitable surely made the men feel uncomfortable and threatened.

One of the problems I had was finding a place where I could discuss business at lunch with the men I was prospecting. Back then, very few women controlled their money, so my prospect base was men over 50 years old. It was uncommon for a woman to take a man to lunch, and the men were somewhat nervous because of what people might say. I needed a place where I would be treated with respect and where a man would not be confused as to how the check would be paid or the motive behind the invitation.

The Akron City Club's membership was at an all time low, and they were operated at a deficit. It is my understanding that the leadership of the Club felt that they should open up the membership to women because they felt that increasing numbers of women would join the business world and become a pool of membership. Let me emphasize that this Club was only one of the few male downtown business clubs that opened its membership to women at this time.

The Club then invited a few prominent women in the community to join: women who abided by the "Low Profile" rule, women who were intelligent and had some kind of connection with long-standing members of the Club. However, no other women came forth to join, and the new women members seldom, if ever, used the Club. I think that more than a few men breathed a sigh of relief.

A member by the name of Mac Rowan came by the Merrill Lynch office one day, sat down at my desk, and said that he thought that I was smart and aggressive and represented the successful businesswoman of the future. He told me that he would like to propose me as a new member. I was happy and excited about the prospect of becoming a member of this organization because of its long, distinguished history, and its fine reputation of services to its members. I knew that the Club was having its problems, but I felt it would make a difference to me in my business and in being accepted by the business community.

Unfortunately, Mac Rowan came to me a few weeks later, and said that he was terrible embarrassed because I had been "blackballed" by some members. I was hurt, and felt that whoever had done this to me did me an injustice. I decided that I would read the bylaws and see what I could do.

A few years before I applied to the Club, they bylaws were amended to allow proposed members to challenge a "blackball." Following the procedures of the bylaws, I wrote a letter to the Board and challenged the members who blackballed me to make their objections public. Obviously, those men who tried to keep me out did not want to face me and the publicity it might bring them. The Board then unanimously passed on my membership.

Shortly after I became a member, the manager left the Club, and then told me the story of the attempt to keep me out. It seems that a stockbroker who frequented the Club, passed around a petition to keep me out at the Men's Grill at noon, because I was "a feminist and would use the Club aggressively for business." I must tell you that in all these years I have not been able to stomach the man, but I understood what I mentioned at the beginning of this history. Many men and women were confused and disturbed at what might happen if women took on new roles.

I personally believe that the City Club was a forerunner in admitting women. I have wonderful memories of the Club because of the way they handled the problem at the time and the respectful treatment I received from the Staff. I always felt that the Staff somehow sympathized with me and tried to make up for the behavior of a few of the membership.