The Minerva Awards are a sometimes overlooked highlight at first lady Maria Shriver's annual Women's Conference at the Long Beach Convention Center.
This is understandable, as the main event brings in some of the best-known women from the worlds of business, politics and entertainment.
But the more-intimate Minerva Awards, an event within an event, seek to recognize humanitarian contributions from people who "make this world a more compassionate, tolerant and just place."
This year's winners fit the bill. Shriver and the event's sponsor, Target Stores, plan to give the awards from 3:30 to 7 p.m. Tuesday.
Singer Alicia Keys and author and attorney Caroline Kennedy plan to speak at the ceremony as well.
This years honorees are:
- Jane Goodall, the renowned primatologist, conservationist and author;
- Kathy Hull, founder of the George Mark Children's House in San Leandro, a residential center that seeks to relieve the symptoms of children with terminal illnesses;
- Agnes Stevens, founder of School on Wheels, which tutors homeless Southern California children ages 6 to 18;
- Helen Devore Waukazoo, co-founder of the Bay Area-based Friendship House, which provides residential substance-abuse treatment for American Indians.
- Shriver introduced the awards, named for the Roman goddess on the California state seal, in 2004.
Past recipients include former first lady Betty Ford, feminist Gloria Steinem, tennis ace and Long Beach native Billie Jean King, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, astronaut Sally Ride and the late Eunice Kennedy Shriver, Maria Shriver's mother and John F. Kennedy's sister.
The larger Women's Conference at the Long Beach Convention Center and Arena is sold out, but tickets, at $40 apiece, to the Minerva Awards are available at www.womensconference.org.
