By Richard Croxdale / The Rag Blog / August 21, 2025
[This article was originally published at People’s History in Texas (PHIT) and was cross-posted to The Rag Blog. The Lone Star Three will be featured on Rag Radio, Friday, August 22, 2025, on KOOP 91.7-FM, 2-3 p.m., in a show co-hosted by Thorne Dreyer and Alice Embree.]
People’s History in Texas attended the opening of Lone Star Three, a documentary on the origins of Roe v Wade. The place was packed with a mixture of oldsters and youngsters.
Lone Star Three is the story of the organizing and the friendship of three women in Austin, Texas, who coalesced around reproductive justice issues in the early ‘70s. The women organized, agitated, and focused on access to abortion and access to birth control which is, boiled-down, access to health care for women.
Victoria Foe, Judy Smith, and Barbara Hines are the three women that are highlighted, but there were many, many more who were involved in the fight. At a minimum, these three should be added to the imaginary University of Texas sculpture garden that PHIT created for Casey Hayden, who is mentioned in an earlier substack.
The three attended the University of Texas at Austin, some in graduate school, some headed to law school, some headed to MacArthur grants.
People’s History in Texas contributed the interview conducted with Judy Smith which was gathered at the reunion of The Rag underground newspaper, when PHIT collected thirty-plus interviews of the Rag staff and of organizing and protests in the ’60s and ’70s. The second part of The Rag: An Underground Newspaper documentary also highlighted other women and other issues in the women’s movement.
All three worked on The Rag. All three were instrumental in the formation of the surge of activity in women’s issues and women’s rights in those years. I think they call that slice of history second-wave feminism in these days. People tell PHIT that if you were living during those days, or were living with someone who was involved, there was no second wave about it. It was just a long overdue demand for some equal treatment.
Lone Star Three is an important documentary. The issue is powerful. The women are powerful. And the story of practical organizing is powerful.
It is the story of three women and their fight for reproductive justice. It turns out to be an impressive story of agency, of taking control of your life, and how sometimes being active can actually lead to change.
Lone Star Three tells the specific story of how these three women who were involved in the battle for reproductive rights in the 1960s and 1970s created the backstory for Roe v Wade.
Two of the women, Judy Smith and Barbara Hines, were interviewed by PHIT in our oral history of the RAG. Judy Smith, who passed away about 10 years ago, was featured through PHIT’s interview. The interview holds up well, I might say.
Barbara Hines was the second. She worked on The Rag, went to law school and later specialized in immigration law.
Victoria Foe also worked on The Rag, but declined to be interviewed back in 2007. A biologist, she was awarded a MacArthur Award in 1993. Here is how she was described… “Foe is a descriptive embryologist with a gift for seeing patterns and with the desire to work out the finest details of a biological process.”
Here’s the story…the history…the herstory.
By 1970, the birth control pill had been developed, but it could only be prescribed for married women, or for women with severe acne. Abortions were illegal. Women were being traumatized, butchered, and killed attempting to have abortions in the backrooms of sleazy incompetent doctors and shifty veterinarians, and… well… self-induced with coat hangers.
The Lone Star Three, along with others, started counseling women…pointing them in the safe direction. PHIT in the Rag interviews talked with some women who actually helped courier the women and sit with them through the process.
Worried about how much legal danger they were in, the three went to Sarah Weddington, a recent graduate of law school. Weddington was a top graduate, but being a woman had not found a job yet. So she was available. They talked about legal strategies. Weddington knew, from a RAG freedom of speech case, about the legal process of asking for a three judge panel to speed up the judicial decision. The Roe v Wade case quickly ended up in the Supreme Court. Weddington argued her case before the Supreme Court at the age of 26, which is quite a stunning bit of bravado, and she won. Roe v Wade was won on the right of privacy, not on the right for woman to control her own body. But it was a win.
Roe v Wade was overturned. Apparently, there is no right to privacy. But, the panel after the movie emphasized women still have the right to self-induce and half the states still allow abortion.
Lone Star Three is the story of the organizing and the friendship of three women in Austin, Texas who coalesced around reproductive justice issues in the early ‘70s. The women organized, agitated, and focused on access to abortion and access to birth control which is, boiled-down, access to health care for women.
Victoria Foe, Judy Smith, and Barbara Hines are the three women that are highlighted, but there were many, many more who were involved in the fight. At a minimum, these three should be added to the imaginary University of Texas sculpture garden that PHIT created for Casey Hayden, who is mentioned in an earlier substack.
The three attended the University of Texas at Austin, some in graduate school, some headed to law school, some headed to MacArthur grants.
People’s History in Texas contributed the interview conducted with Judy Smith which was gathered at the reunion of the RAG underground newspaper, when PHIT collected thirty-plus interviews of the RAGstaff and of organizing and protests in the 60s and 70s. The second part of The Rag: An Underground Newspaper documentary also highlighted other women and other issues in the women’s movement.
All three worked on the RAG. All three were instrumental in the formation of the surge of activity in women’s issues and women’s rights in those years. I think they call that slice of history second-wave feminism in these days. People tell PHIT that if you were living during those days, or were living with someone who was involved, there was no second wave about it. It was just a long overdue demand for some equal treatment.
Lone Star Three is an important documentary. The issue is powerful. The women are powerful. And the story of practical organizing is powerful.
It is the story of three women and their fight for reproductive justice. It turns out to be an impressive story of agency, of taking control of your life, and how sometimes being active can actually lead to change.
Lone Star Three tells the specific story of how these three women who were involved in the battle for reproductive rights in the 1960s and 1970s created the backstory for Roe v Wade.
Two of the women, Judy Smith and Barbara Hines, were interviewed by PHIT in our oral history of the RAG. Judy Smith, who passed away about ten years ago, was featured through PHIT’s interview. The interview holds up well, I might say.
Barbara Hines was the second. She worked on the Rag, went to law school and later specialized in immigration law.
Victoria Foe also worked on the RAG, but declined to be interviewed back in 2007. A biologist, she was awarded a MacArthur Award in 1993. Here is how she was described… ”Foe is a descriptive embryologist with a gift for seeing patterns and with the desire to work out the finest details of a biological process.”
Here’s the story…the history…the herstory.
By 1970, the birth control pill had been developed, but it could only be prescribed for married women, or for women with severe acne. Abortions were illegal. Women were being traumatized, butchered and killed attempting to have abortions in the backrooms of sleazy incompetent doctors and shifty veterinarians, and …well…self-induced with coat hangers.
Judy Smith on the abortion hotline, a pay phone outside the Rag office. Photo by Alan Pogue / The Rag.
The Lone Star Three, along with others, started counseling women…pointing them in the safe direction. PHIT in the Rag interviews talked with some women who actually helped courier the women and sit with them through the process.
Worried about how much legal danger they were in, the three went to Sarah Weddington, a recent graduate of law school. Weddington was a top graduate, but being a woman had not found a job yet. So she was available. They talked about legal strategies. Weddington knew, from a RAG freedom of speech case, about the legal process of asking for a three judge panel to speed up the judicial decision. The Roe v Wade case quickly ended up in the Supreme Court. Weddington argued her case before the Supreme Court at the age of 26, which is a quite a stunning bit of bravado, and she won. Roe v Wade was won on the right of privacy, not on the right for woman to control her own body. But it was a win.
Roe v Wade was overturned. Apparently, there is no right to privacy. But, the panel after the movie emphasized women still have the right to self-induce and half the states still allow abortion.
