As the Director/Producer of the documentaries in the Trilogy, I want to welcome you and thank you for coming to this web site. These films, seven years in production, are the work of several hundred people, notably Videographer/Producer Daniel Meyers, Writer/Producer Beth Seltzer, Editor Nila Bogue, Composer/Musician Erika Luckett and Executive Producer, Danny McGuire (PBS Affiliate KTEH-TV), all of whom worked on all of the films. These documentaries are now yours to use.

My motivation for creating this series of documentaries is that when I was in college, I had an illegal back-alley abortion.  It was 1962.  I was unintentionally pregnant, 22 years old, working my way through college.  I had no savings, and no committed partner.  Ashamed of my condition, secretly, I went alone to another state.  For $600 cash (which I had borrowed), I arranged for a back-alley abortion.  I had to trust a complete stranger.  I was blindfolded and never saw the face of the abortionist.  Within 24 hours after the procedure, I started hemorrhaging.  I was rushed to the hospital emergency room, with a fever of 105° and blood poisoning.  My own doctor, who had refused to provide a safe abortion, could now, legally, try to save my life.  Because I was a student at Stanford, I received the best care from the University Hospital.  As a result of this medical attention I survived.  During those same years, throughout the United States, thousands of women in my condition had died.  Many were sheltered in poorly staffed and under-supplied county and state hospitals.  I didn't know any of this at that time.  Nobody discussed abortion.  I didn't tell anyone -- family, friends, roommates, no one, nor discuss the whole event for almost thirty years. 

In 1991, anti-choice nominations for Supreme Court Justices were ominous.  For three decades, I had remained silent about my own back-alley brush with death.  Meanwhile, the right to a safe abortion was slipping away for the next generation.  Now was the time to step forward.  One by one, I found women who had lived through that era and were ready to break the silence.  I also found people who had tried to help women find safe care, and were willing to tell the stories of the part they played. 

The Trilogy weaves together the history and the current chapter of this saga.
CONCENTRIC MEDIA outreach supports screenings of the Trilogy on television broadcasts and in a host of other venues across the country. Throughout 1999 and in 2000, all these activities will continue, with the addition of the Spanish language subtitled versions of the Trilogy.

Your help in presenting these films in your community is deeply appreciated.

Ways you can help

• Call your local Cable Access TV station and request broadcasts. We provide tapes free of charge. 
• Show one or more at a meeting of a group to which you belong. 
• Schedule a screening on a local college campus or other learning situations. 
• Consider holding a Roe Anniversary screening in mid-January 2000. 
• When a screening is scheduled, whether a broadcast or an event, you can help get the word out.

Thank you for your interest in protecting choice.

 Sincerely,

Dorothy Fadiman
Director/Producer