In honor of Women’s History month, the St. Joseph Museums will present a history program this week on several local women.

St. Joseph Museums Curator of Collections Sarah Elder said she will be presenting on a selection of 15 women who have contributed to local, state or international history.

“There’s educators, there are musicians, geologists, there are painters… there’s one, maybe two that are notorious for what they did and that’s all I’m going to say about that,” Elder said. “We have a physician’s surgeon, nurses, just a lot of things and a lot of what makes some of these women very unique is that they were doing these things at a time when women weren’t working outside the home.”

Elder said she’s presented the program several times over the years and she first started putting it together with the help of a book found in the reference library at the museum, “Who’s Who in St. Joseph of 1929.”

“When I was asked to do this program, the internet was available but wasn’t quite as extensive… so I was relying on books and newspapers. I started with that ‘Who’s Who of St. Joseph of 1929′ and found some pictures, found information and that led me to some dates, then I was able to go to the St. Joseph Public Library and use the newspapers on microfilm and… kind of fleshed out the stories a little bit,” Elder said. “As time has gone by, as the internet has gotten more vast and has gotten more resources and been able to find out a little bit more, I’ve been able to update and add more about these individuals to the program.”

The program, “St. Joseph Women” takes place at 6 p.m. on Thursday at the St. Joseph Museum at 3406 Frederick Avenue. The event is free and open to the public. For more information, click here.