Women of Bethlehem Steel: Spotlight on Myrna Rivera by Hannah Provost
Myrna Rivera was born in Puerto Rico, but considers herself a native of Bethlehem, PA. At six months old, her mother and father brought her to Bethlehem, and she spent her entire life and career here. Rivera’s story, and her work at Bethlehem Steel, reveals the nuances of cultural expectations for women during the 1970s, as she was growing up and joining the workforce. Rivera remembers that, in 1972, when she was graduating high school, it was not a time when very many women went to college, and for her, that attitude was particularly entrenched in her family’s culture.