12 www.CharlestonWomenPodcast.com | www.ReadCW.com | www.Instagram.com/CharlestonWomen Feature Opportunities abound for women in business today, thanks to the dogged efforts of countless others who came before and didn’t let the norms of the day hold them back. Facing many challenges and bucking the prevailing thought in the 20th century that only men should own a business, some local women forged ahead and paved the way. Alice T. Beckett was a local pioneer for women in the field of law. Born in 1908, she became one of the first 100 female attorneys in South Carolina, blazing the trail for future generations of women barristers. In the 1940s, Beckett apprenticed with the prestigious Charleston law firm Legge and Gibbes and was mentored by Lionel K. Legge, who was later a justice on the South Carolina Supreme Court. She was one of only 10 women to pass the bar in 1946 and obtained the highest average of anyone who sat for it that year. She then opened her own practice in Walterboro and became the first woman to practice law there, specializing in real estate law and wills. Beckett’s personal mantra and advice to new lawyers was that honesty is the best policy and to women lawyers, to expect and demand respect. Today it’s not uncommon for women to have their own law firm. Local attorney, Debra Stokes, explained, “I opened my own practice so that I could maintain the flexibility needed to be an engaged mother for my children. After 43 years of practice, I have never regretted this decision.” Women like Beckett paved the way for women like Trailblazers in The Lowcountry Pioneers in female entrepreneurship BY MARY COY
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