When Sandra Kent began working on bringing Anita Hill to Detroit, she was shocked that her 17-year-old granddaughter didn't know who Hill was.
"My granddaughter is an honor student ," Kent said. "She has been to Europe twice. She is a smart, accomplished young woman and she asked me, 'Grandma, who is Anita Hill?'"
Twenty years ago this month, Hill's story became national news and she unwittingly emerged as an international champion for women's rights who was both applauded and castigated for waking up the nation to the realities of sexual harassment in the workplace.
Hill, a professor and senior adviser to the provost at Brandeis University near Boston, will visit Detroit on Nov. 3-4 to talk about her latest book, "Reimagining Equality: Stories of Gender, Race, and Finding Home."
And as much as Hill probably would like to focus on her new book -- part family story, part examination of the detrimental impact of the housing crisis on women and people of color -- it's her old story that continues to captivate people.
"Twenty years ago I might have thought myself powerless, now I feel differently," said Hill, 55. "I now know that one voice can make a difference. So now the question is how do I use my voice to make a difference not only in my life, but in the lives of others?"
Hill didn't write the script for her life story. It was written for her.
Senate investigators subpoenaed her to testify about rumors that then-U.S. Supreme Court nominee Clarence Thomas had sexually harassed women who worked for him.
Hill, a University of Oklahoma law professor at the time, told the Senate Judiciary Committee that she had repeatedly been the victim of sexual harassment by Thomas, her former boss at the U.S. Department of Education and the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission. Thomas vehemently denied the charges.
The televised hearings riveted the nation.
When they were over, Thomas was confirmed a Supreme Court justice. Hill was disappointed, but not defeated.
And much to her surprise, her testimony helped women throughout America find their voice.
A once-taboo subject -- sexual harassment -- became the hot topic at office water coolers and on factory floors. Women, in record numbers, filed complaints rather than keep quiet about their own experiences. Laws on sexual harassment were strengthened. Workplace regulations combating sexual harassment became commonplace. Academic studies increased.
"Her standing up was a powerful step forward in improving the way sexual harassment was discussed and dealt with in the workplace," said law professor Jocelyn Benson, associate director of the Damon Keith Center for Civil Rights at Wayne State University's School of Law.
"She forever changed the way we talk about sexual harassment in the work place. A lot of women were not speaking up because of fear of losing their job or fear of retaliation. Her willingness to put herself forward made it easier for other women to speak up. Yes, it didn't stop Thomas' appointment, but it emboldened women to step up and speak out."
"If you look at EEOC statistics, you'll find clear evidence that complaints of sexual harassment sky-rocketed after Anita Hill's testimony," said Lilia Cortina, a University of Michigan researcher and professor of women's studies.
According to a book coauthored by Cortina, the EEOC received one complaint of sexual harassment in 1980. In 1991, the year Hill testified, there were 6,870 complaints filed with the EEOC. The following year, in 1992, some 10,532 were filed, and the numbers continued to grow significantly before tapering off in more recent years.
Hill said she initially was angry and disappointed when Thomas was confirmed.
"I felt it was a rejection of my experience, and I felt they didn't understand the relevance of my testimony to Thomas' respect for the law. He did these things while he was in charge of enforcing sexual harassment laws."
She was vilified by critics who attempted to cast her as a liar and male-hating feminist. The drama re-ignited last year when Thomas' wife, Virginia, left a message on Hill's Brandeis voice mail asking her to apologize for what she'd said at the confirmation hearings. Hill reported the call to campus police who turned it over to the FBI.
Hill has no plans to apologize.
"When someone tells the truth, there's no need to apologize," said Hill. "I knew I'd done the right thing. Once you have that in the back of your mind, it allows you to deal with the consequences."
In the years since the hearings, Hill found comfort and strength in the impact of the hearings, noting that there were legal, cultural and political changes after the hearings. "The conversations men and women began having with their sons and daughters about sexual harassment changed. Those are not defeats, those are triumphs."
Hill also found sustenance in thousands of letters she received and continues to receive since the hearings. Women, she discovered, were finding their voice to speak out not only about sexual harassment but a variety of concerns. And one concern that especially touched Hill was the impact of the foreclosure crisis.
It led her to examine anew her own home and family roots. She is the youngest daughter of 13 children, born to parents who owned and farmed the land they lived on in Oklahoma.
The book that resulted examines the historical significance of home ownership and shows the disproportionately negative impact the housing crisis is having on women and people of color. It also challenges the nation's leaders to do more to make America home for all its citizens.
"The American dream has been severely jeopardized," Hill said. "What does that mean economically and socially as we attempt to advance toward equality? The hardest hit by the foreclosure crisis has been single women and communities of color."
But even as Hill focuses on how the housing crisis threatens equality, the story that drew her into the public spotlight dominates discussions during her book tour.
It is part of what led Sandra Kent, president of the Women's Economic Empowerment Group, to help bring Hill to Detroit, with assistance from the Michigan Women's Foundation.
Kent recalls being the victim of sexual harassment in the early 1970s when she was a pharmaceutical sales rep in Detroit.
When she went to one doctor's office to deliver supplies, the doctor attempted to give her a chocolate penis tied with a red ribbon. Horrified, Kent reported the incident to her boss, who visited the doctor's office. Kent said her boss seemed more concerned about keeping the doctor's account than addressing the harassment.
"People could say and do all kinds of insulting things to you, and you felt you couldn't do anything," Kent said. Until Anita Hill.
During Hill's visit, Kent has arranged a special meeting between Hill and girls at the Detroit International Academy for Young Women, an all-female public school, which has a club named Anita's Aspiring Attorneys, that promotes leadership among young women.
The girls in the 20-member club are reading Hill's books.
"She is very brave," said Sierra Johnson, 17. "I like how she had the courage to step up and tell everybody what happened to her. A lot of people wouldn't say anything."
Khadijah Shabazz, 17, said Hill's first book, "Speaking Truth to Power," is an inspiration. "Her example teaches me to believe in myself and not put boundaries around myself or let anyone put boundaries around me."
Hill said she hasn't yet decided what she will say to the young women. But she knows a few things she hopes they will learn from her.
"I want them to believe in themselves. I want them to know that they will be challenged in life. That's what happens. But I hope they come away feeling they have personal power and authority to control their life and to make the right choices. And I want them to know they deserve to have good, and happy and productive lives."
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