Marilyn Stone (later known as Merlin Stone)

Marilyn Stone (who later became known as the feminist author, Merlin Stone) got her start in Buffalo, New York. She received a B.S. in art with a minor in journalism and teaching certificate from the University of Buffalo in 1958. She taught at the Albright-Knox Art Gallery School, 1957-66 and at the State University of New York at Buffalo in 1962 and 1966. She moved to California and in 1968 earned her M.F.A. from the California College of Arts and Crafts (now California College of the Arts) in Oakland, and taught there in 1968 and 1969, as well as at the University of California San Francisco Extension, San Francisco, in 1969. Next, she headed overseas. From 1971 to 1976 Stone engaged in independent study at the Ashmolean Museum in Oxford, England, and in libraries throughout Europe and the Near and Middle East.

Marilyn Stone was also a sculptor, practicing her art and exhibiting between 1958 and 1967. During this time she executed numerous architectural sculpture commissions in New York. Her career branched out as she became Coordinator of Experiments in Art and Technology (EAT) in the Bay area, 1969 and 1970. As she became more involved in spiritual and political issues surrounding the history of female experience, she became the conceiver, organizer, and director of “The Return of the Goddess,” a series of four one-hour radio programs produced by Canadian Broadcasting Corp. (CBC) in 1986; as well as two Goddess Festivals in New York City and Toronto. As an award-winning author and lecturer, Merlin Stone presented to students and general audiences in the U.S., Canada, and Europe. She was featured in the 1989 documentary Goddess Remembered.

Among her best-known publications and projects are:

• When God Was a Woman, Dial, 1976, published in England as The Paradise Papers: The Suppression of Women's Rights, Quartet Books, 1976, produced by Linda Perry as a series of thirteen one-hour programs, Pacifica Radio (WBAI-FM), New York, 1978.
• Ancient Mirrors of Womanhood: Our Goddess and Heroine Heritage, New Sibylline, 1979.
• Three Thousand Years of Racism--Recurring Patterns in Racism (booklet), New Sibylline, 1981.
• (With Olympia Dukakis) The Voice of Earth (based on the Sibyl of Delphi), produced at Williams College, Williamstown, MA, and at the William Carlos Williams Theatre, Rutherford, NJ, both 1990.