Sing Out about 

this UNsung Woman 

June, 2022 

Sponsored by ArtRoots, 

a Writer in Residence Project 

June 2022 

Submitted by 

By Natalie Chulew and Tom Rutkowski 

“From her early days as a member of the Central American Solidarity Committee to her many years as a County Supervisor, Diane Lange has always led by example, and she hasn’t slowed down since,” writes Tom Rutkowsk.  “To write of all that Diane has done for Racine would require many chapters.  However, I know that recognizing her many contributions Diane has made many worthy causes is fitting and well deserved. 

And Natalie Chulew writes, “In addition to collaborating with social justice groups, Diane draws on her experiences as a public health nurse and public school teacher to effectively gain access and respond to individuals’ needs with assistance from community organizations.  She adeptly enlists friends and acquaintances from different backgrounds and ages, maximizing talents to build community strength, awareness and power. Diane embraces others with kindness, respect and gratitude.” 

Most recently, Diane was a part of an effort led by a statewide group called Building Unity, an effort to raise awareness to extend the Line 5 Enbridge tar sands pipeline close to tribal territories in Northern Wisconsin. Diane took a leadership role in planning eight weekly events that drew attention to indigenous rights, climate change and protection of waters.  Each event drew large groups in attendance and received considerable attention in local media. Planning and organizing such events takes a lot of work behind-the-scenes.  Like all of the initiatives she’s led, Diane was tireless in her efforts to make sure that the event went as planned and caused people to think of an issue that previously did not get much attention. 

Diane is the leader of the social justice committee at Olympia Brown Unitarian Universalist Church raising funds to sponsor immigrant families in Racine and in organizing a supportive group to help ease the transition to a new community.  Diane has also been active in recruiting gardeners for the Racine Urban Garden Network, cultivating diversity; fresh, local foods and gardening  know-how. 

Diane Lange deserves to be one among those women who have made a difference. 

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In love with life  

By Jeanne Arnold 

We are persons who face the future without another’s rules or creeds; yet our self-discipline sets a strict standard of ethics where integrity is sacred.  

We are seekers rather than believers. If we have a faith, it is our confidence that our search for the truth is as important as finding it.  

We often discover individually a wellspring of wisdom, strength and beauty within our own minds and hearts, which frees us to trust ourselves.  

We come together to reinforce and renew ourselves with others who also have the freedom to decide and to choose and to live the ideas and actions that they think is best for themselves and their dealings with others and with the world.  

Together we seek to grow in  

self knowledge, self respect, self reliance.  

We are hopeful, joyful people who live deliberately and openly so that our lives have happiness and love and so that our work is for the best things that humankind can know and hope for.  

We believe that a person’s faith is best shown by how they live each day. We know that if we live the best life we can now, we need not fear the future.
Together we affirm that  

life is good, people are good.  

We are free to believe or not to believe. Our faith imposes no creeds—not because we have no beliefs but because we are not to be restrained in our beliefs. In a continuing dialogue with others who value a free exchange of ideas, we grow in knowledge, sympathy and understanding.  

Together we are united in diversity because our thoughts are free.   

We strive for self-confidence and a feeling of worth that helps us grow naturally and intelligently toward a personal faith in what we understand and an open mind to wonder about what we cannot comprehend.  

By the kind of persons we become and by the way we treat others, we try to make the most of our lives so that people, and the earth, will be glad that we have lived.  

Free from fear and intimidation, each one is  

free to be me.

Graphics by Mary Nelson