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could glean about Piraye Sadullah Tor and Saadet Refet was that they were both members of the TKB
Board of Directors who participated in the 1935 Congress and that they also served on several
commissions. We were able to find some limited biographical information about the alternate
delegates Madiha Fethi, Zekâvet Zâti and Arayiş Hüseyin. During the preparatory stages of the 12 th
Congress, well known women jurists in the 1930s – Süreyya Ağaoğlu, Güzide Lütfü and Faika Hanım –
helped the TKB's newly formed commission – The Civil Status of Turkish Women – so as to prepare a
legal infrastructure for a report to be delivered at the Congress by the TKB delegates. Other legal
support was provided by another jurist, Beyhan Nil, who ranked as the Turkish Republic's first
woman judge. She acted as Turkey's representative to the Commission on the Civil Status of Women,
a commission that had been directly established by, and under the auspices of, the International
Alliance.
Among the TKB alternate delegates to the 1935 Congress, TKB members of the Administrative
Board Piraye Sadullah, Saadet Refet and Ayşe Remzi had, as I mentioned earlier, all worked on
various commissions. Piraye Sadullah served on two commissions that had been established during
the preparatory period: Commission for Equal Conditions of Work between Men and Women and the
Commission on the Nationality of Married Women. 2 Because she is listed by the Congress notes as
domiciling at the Şehzedebaşı Dormitory for Young Girl Students, we may assume that she was a
teacher. Saadet Refet is listed as residing at İnkılap Avenue No. 20 in Üsküdar. Ayşe Remzi was 20 th
on the Cumhuriyet Halk Fırkası list of Beykoz City Council candidates and is noted as residing at
Pangaltı Apt. No. 3. 3 Both Leman Fuat, who was not a member of TKB's administration but
nonetheless named a full delegate, and alternate delegate Arayiş Hüseyin, served on the Commission
for Equal Conditions of Work between Men and Women, while Faika Nahit served on the Commission
on the Nationality of Married Women and the Commission for Equality on the Legal Status between
Men and Women. The only information we were able to glean about Arayiş Hüseyin is that she began
to work for the Maritime Lines when Emine Saffet traveled for the company to Iran on 15 October,
1936 and suggested that Arayiş Hanım (most likely Arayiş Hüseyin) be hired to work temporarily in
her place. Additionally, at the close of the Congress, as the Deputy Chairman of the International
Alliance Rosa Manus expressed her gratitude to Mustafa Kemal Atatürk, the government officials,
and to many members of the TKB, she also mentioned 4 both Emine Saffet and Arayiş Hanım by name.
We may conclude from this that these women had personally worked closely with Manus. Vecihe
Ziya was the only member of the TKB board of directors who did not serve as a delegate to the 1935
Congress. Despite this, she served as a member on the Commission for Equality on the Legal Status
between Men and Women and the Commission for Equal Conditions of Work between Men and
Women. Vecihe Ziya was born in Istanbul in September, 1907, and was a primary, middle school, and
high school graduate of the American Girls College in Arnavutköy. She began writing at an early age
and was interested in the theater. During her school years she acted in many important plays and
was noted for her success in these roles. The author and public speaker Meliha Avni Sözen referred
to her as “The Queen of the Stage.” In 1933 Ziya staged a play she had written herself, Fadime, and
this first musical was quite successful. Some of her plays were staged at the schools at which she
worked as a teacher and some were staged by the City Theater.
Vecihe Ziya began her professional career as an English teacher at the Çapa Girls' Teaching School
and she wrote a poem about this school. Her teaching career lasted for a full 37 years. 5 Besides the
school in Çapa, she also taught at the Istanbul School for Girls, the Şişli Terakki High School, the
Istanbul Atatürk Girls' High School and at Eseniş College. A 1969 ad relating to Vecihe Ziya notes 6 her
as residing in the Ufukpalas Apartment at 3/11 Vişnezade Babaefendi Street in Beşiktaş. 7 This means
that Vecihe Ziya, who died in 2005, had lived for seventy years, from 1935 to 2005, at the same
address.
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