The 9 to 5 Project

FAIN: TR-250112-16

Community Media Productions (Yellow Springs, OH 45387-1625)
Julia Reichert (Project Director: January 2016 to September 2016)
Steven Bognar (Project Director: September 2016 to present)

Production of a 60-minute documentary that examines the history of the 9 to 5 movement, an organization of women office workers that began in 1973.

Most of us have heard the song “Nine to Five,” sung with an edge by Dolly Parton. Then there’s the star studded film 9 TO 5, the second highest grossing movie of 1980. Yet few realize that these two icons of popular culture actually grew out of a social movement that spanned over twenty-five years, and which sought to have a profound impact on work for women, and the labor movement itself. In the early 1970s, a group of women office workers in Boston decided that they had suffered in silence long enough. They created an organization to force changes in their workplaces. By the late 1970s, similar groups of women office workers had sprung up across the country. This movement is a largely unexplored area of U.S. twentieth century history. It encapsulates a unique intersection of the women’s movement and the labor movement. The film we are making seeks to discover the story and the long-term implications of this movement.