Marlene Trestman

Honoring her mentor, attorney-turned-author Marlene Trestman wrote Fair Labor Lawyer: The Remarkable Life of New Deal Attorney and Supreme Court Advocate Bessie Margolin (LSU Press, 2016). Following graduation from Goucher College, Trestman earned her law degree from George Washington University and her MBA from Maryland’s Loyola University and has received research funding from the National Endowment for the Humanities, Supreme Court Historical Society, Hadassah-Brandeis Institute, American Jewish Archives, and Texas Jewish Historical Society. A native of New Orleans, Trestman lives in Baltimore, Maryland, where she is writing her second book, Most Fortunate Unfortunates: New Orleans’s Jewish Orphans’ Home, 1855-1946 (LSU Press, forthcoming). www.marlenetrestman.com

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Image of Bessie Margolin in 1955

Bessie Margolin

Bessie Margolin was raised in New Orleans’s Jewish orphanage, where she learned powerful lessons in social justice that propelled her trailblazing legal career through the New Deal and Nazi War Crimes Trials to the United State Supreme Court, where she championed the rights of millions of American workers. A reluctant feminist who became the nation’s top fighter for equal pay for women and a co-founder of NOW, Margolin used intellect and charm to open courtroom doors for countless women who have followed.

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How to cite this page

Jewish Women's Archive. "Marlene Trestman." (Viewed on November 29, 2024) <https://jwa.org/encyclopedia/author/trestman-marlene>.