DOCSLIB.ORG

The Educational Activism of the Sawyer-Flowers-Wilson Family in America from 1866 to 1986

Total Page：16

File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb

Download full-text PDF Read full-text
The Educational Activism of the Sawyer-Flowers-Wilson Family in America from 1866 to 1986 “OUR CHILDREN’S CHILDREN LIVE FOREVER”: THE EDUCATIONAL ACTIVISM OF THE SAWYER-FLOWERS-WILSON FAMILY IN AMERICA FROM 1866 TO 1986 by Christina Joy Thomas A thesis submitted to the faculty of The University of North Carolina at Charlotte in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts in History Charlotte 2017 Approved by: ______________________________ Dr. Sonya Ramsey ______________________________ Dr. Gregory Mixon ______________________________ Dr. Cheryl Hicks ii ©2017 Christina Joy Thomas ALL RIGHTS RESERVED iii ABSTRACT CHRISTINA JOY THOMAS. “Our children’s children live forever”: The educational activism of the Sawyer-Flowers-Wilson family from 1866 to 1986. (Under the direction of DR. SONYA RAMSEY) Since slavery, Southern states prohibited the education of Black Americans. Post- emancipation, the first actions of these newly emancipated Black men and women involved the opening of informal and formal schools. The self-determination of Black Americans fueled their desire for an education. Despite major advancements in Black education, white opposition continued to hinder the education of Black children and adults through racial violence, segregation, and limited to no funding for Black schools. In response to these injustices, Black educational activists determined to acquire an equal education for their people’s children. They utilized education as a “weapon of the weak”, or a tool of resistance against white opposition. For one Black American family, the Sawyer-Flowers-Wilson family, educational activists emerged across three generations of their history from Reconstruction to the late twentieth century building Black schools, detesting school boards and their support of segregation, and adapting early childhood education curricula to the needs of Black children. The biographies of grandfather Joseph J. Sawyer, granddaughter Rachel H. Flowers, and great-granddaughter Geraldine L. Wilson, each displayed their familial commitment to Black education. iv DEDICATION I dedicate this thesis to Joseph Sawyer, Rachel Flowers, and Geraldine Wilson and their commitment to the education of Black children. You each renewed my love and appreciation of Black history. v ACKNOWLEDGMENTS First, I would like to extend a thank you to my thesis committee—Dr. Sonya Ramsey, Dr. Gregory Mixon, and Dr. Cheryl Hicks—for their guidance throughout this thesis writing journey. I am also thankful for the financial support of Dr. Bernardo Michael and the Office of Diversity Affairs at Messiah College in addition to multiple individuals at this institution—librarians Lawrie Merz and Beth Hostetler Mark for their addition assistance throughout my research journey and archivist Glen Pierce for sharing his extensive knowledge of Messiah College’s archives and for continuing to make the archives accessible to me as I continued my studies in North Carolina. Lastly, I would like to acknowledge Nandi Wilson, a descendant of this truly remarkable family. After four years of researching this family’s history and searching for a living descendant, I recently connected with Wilson who happily embraced my research. I am thankful for her support of my research and entrusting me with her family’s history. My hope is that I have done justice to the biographies of your great- great grandfather Sawyer, your great-aunt Rachel, and your beloved aunt Geraldine. vi TABLE OF CONTENTS LIST OF TABLES vii LIST OF FIGURES viii LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS xiv CHAPTER ONE: INTRODUCTION 1 CHAPTER TWO: “THE LORD IS BLESSING US ALSO”: REVEREND JOSEPH 9 J. SAWYER AND THE POST-EMANCIPATION MOVEMENT, 1866 TO 1919 CHAPTER THREE: “WHAT HAVE YOU TO SAY?”: RACHEL HELEN 56 FLOWERS AND THE FIGHT FOR EDUCATIONAL EQUALITY IN THE JIM CROW NORTH, 1900 TO 1988 CHAPTER FOUR: “WHAT SHALL I TEACH MY CHILDREN WHO ARE 104 BLACK”: GERALDINE LOUISE WILSON AND MISSISSIPPI’S PROJECT HEAD START, 1931 TO 19861 CHATPER FIVE: CONCLUSION 156 APPENDIX A: GERALDINE WILSON’S RESUME 171 vii LIST OF TABLES TABLE ONE: Joseph J. Sawyer’s Teacher Monthly Report from January to 35 June 1870 in Southampton County, Virginia viii LIST OF FIGURES FIGURE ONE: Joseph J. Sawyer’s Monthly Teacher Report (July 1869) 32 FIGURE TWO: Map detailing Sawyer’s movements in Florida from the 1870s 51 to the 1890s FIGURE THREE: Ministers in the African M.E. Church, in Eastern Florida. From 55 the “Proceedings of the Quarto Centennial Conference of the African M.E. Church of South Carolina at Charleston, S.C. May 1, 16, and 17, 1889. Source: Photographic Collection, Florida State Archives. FIGURE FOUR: Rachel Flowers’ Class Photo at Messiah Bible School and 76 Missionary Training Home [between 1916-1918]. FIGURE FIVE: Various photos of Rachel Flowers at Messiah Bible School and 78 Missionary Training Home ix LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS AMA American Missionary Association AME African Methodist Episcopal Church AMEZ African Methodist Episcopal Zion Church CDGM Child Development Group of Mississippi CME Colored Methodist Episcopal Church COFO Council of Federated Organizations CORE Congress of Racial Equality FAS Free African Society FCM Friends of Children of Mississippi MACE Mississippi Action for Community Education ME Methodist Episcopal MFDP Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party MIECE Mississippi Institute for Early Childhood Education NAACP National Association for the Advancement of Colored People NBCDI National Black Child Development Institute NYU New York University OEO Office of Economic Opportunity PAS Pennsylvania Abolition Society SCLC Southern Christian Leadership Conference SNCC Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee TIECE Tougaloo Institute for Early Childhood Education CHAPTER ONE: INTRODUCTION My introduction to the Sawyer-Flowers-Wilson family came from no history book, but through my undergraduate studies at Messiah College in Grantham, Pennsylvania. In a first-year seminar class, my professors asked my classmates and I to find visual representations of diversity around the school. Located across the college were marquees celebrating Messiah’s multicultural legacy. On these posters stood images of Meshach Krikorian, one of the first international students to attend the college in 1911; a portrait of Oscar Marshall, a Black dentist who donated his estate to provide scholarships for students; and an image of Rachel Flowers, the first Black student to attend the institution 1916. In the accompanying biography, the last line read, “Although there is much unknown about Rachel, our hope is that her presence will be remembered and that in the future her full story may be told.”1 This sparked my research interest in Rachel as I attempted to understand what brought her to the college, her experience there, and her family’s history. Although many of my original research questions remained unanswered, I was left with the history of an influential Black woman who held a commitment to improving the education of Black children. As I researched Rachel’s biography, my interests expanded to the biographies of her grandfather, Reverend Joseph J. Sawyer (1836-1919), and niece, Geraldine Louise 1 “The Multicultural Century”, date accessed April 24, 2017, http://www.messiah.edu/centennial/multicultural_century.html 2 Wilson (1931-1986). I found that Rachel’s dedication to Black education was more than just a personal commitment, but a familial commitment preserved across each generation. Sawyer, Rachel, and Geraldine’s commitment expressed the family’s self-determination to teach Black children despite white opposition. Historian V.P. Franklin discussed this phenomenon in Black Self-Determination: A Cultural History of the Faith of the Fathers.2 Franklin’s definition of self- determination involved “politically and economically oppressed groups that define themselves as a people or “nation,” but do not participate in a meaningful way in decisions affecting their lives and the lives of their children.”3 Scholar W.E.B. Du Bois identified self-determination as one out of three cultural responses of Black people to their predicament in America.4 Franklin further elaborated on Du Bois’ idea of self- determination stating, “The Afro-American firmly believed in the “promise of democracy”; and as he emerged from the nineteenth century, he was hopeful that is would be possible for a man to be both a Negro and an American without being cursed and spit upon by his fellows, without having the doors of opportunity closed roughly in his face.”5 Throughout American history, education was one of those doors of opportunity repeatedly closed in the face of Black people. Because of white opposition education became a “weapon of the weak”, or a tool of resistance utilized by Black Americans as they continued forward in their long journey to freedom. 2 V.P. Franklin, Black Self-Determination: A Cultural History of the Faith of the Fathers, (Westport, CT: Lawrence Hill and Company, 1984). 3 Ibid, ix. 4 Ibid, 24. 5 Ibid, 15. 3 Anthropologist James C. Scott originated the term “weapons of the weak” in Weapons of the Weak: Everyday Forms of Peasant Resistance. His ethnography, conducted during the last two years of Malaysia’s Green Revolution, 1967-1979, encompassed a period of technological innovation in agriculture.6 As a class struggle erupted between peasants and wealthy landowners, Scott identified these peasants’ various everyday forms of resistance, or weapons of the weak, as foot dragging, sabotage, dishonesty, and desertion.7 This theory, although applied to Malaysian peasants, transcends beyond this nation to the conditions of
Load more

Recommended publications
  • Weekly Anglo-African the Pine and Palm
    Weekly Anglo-African and The Pine and Palm Excerpts from 1861–1862 Edited and Introduction by Brigitte Fielder, Cassander Smith, and Derrick R. Spires for Just Teach One–Early African American Print Introduction subscription agents) coalesce against a common enemy: James Brigitte Fielder, Cassander Smith, and Derrick R. Spires Redpath (1833-1891) and Haitian emigration. At the same time, this transition speaks to the precariousness of newspaper funding, as Thomas Hamilton (1823-1865) was forced to sell Resolved, That we firmly, flatly, uncompromisingly the Weekly Anglo-African to James Redpath, who then oppose, condemn and denounce as unfair and unjust, as unwise rebranded the Weekly for a new purpose. It speaks to the and as unchristian, the fleeing, colonizing efforts urged by interracial and international character of the newspaper James Redpath, the white, seconded by George Lawrence, Jr., business more broadly and the importance of tracing financing. the black, who is employed by him. Hamilton, for instance sought funding for the Weekly Anglo- Resolved, That we do not deny the right of Mr. James African from a wide range of sources: white abolitionist Redpath and a Boston firm of white gentlemen to give eleven supporters such as John Jay, Jr, black activists such as James hundred dollars for the “Anglo-African,” and for Mr. Redpath McCune Smith, selling books out of his offices, and borrowing to bind Mr. Thomas Hamilton, the late proprietor thereof, not against a life insurance policy he took out on himself for that 1 to issue another paper for circulation among the colored purpose. Throughout these efforts, no one questioned people; but we do declare that he is not justified in the Hamilton’s status as the paper’s proprietor or the paper’s status deceptive policy of placing at the head of the paper, like the as a black newspaper.
    [Show full text]
  • "Citizens in the Making": Black Philadelphians, the Republican Party and Urban Reform, 1885-1913
    University of Pennsylvania ScholarlyCommons Publicly Accessible Penn Dissertations 2017 "Citizens In The Making": Black Philadelphians, The Republican Party And Urban Reform, 1885-1913 Julie Davidow University of Pennsylvania, [email protected] Follow this and additional works at: https://repository.upenn.edu/edissertations Part of the United States History Commons Recommended Citation Davidow, Julie, ""Citizens In The Making": Black Philadelphians, The Republican Party And Urban Reform, 1885-1913" (2017). Publicly Accessible Penn Dissertations. 2247. https://repository.upenn.edu/edissertations/2247 This paper is posted at ScholarlyCommons. https://repository.upenn.edu/edissertations/2247 For more information, please contact [email protected]. "Citizens In The Making": Black Philadelphians, The Republican Party And Urban Reform, 1885-1913 Abstract “Citizens in the Making” broadens the scope of historical treatments of black politics at the end of the nineteenth century by shifting the focus of electoral battles away from the South, where states wrote disfranchisement into their constitutions. Philadelphia offers a municipal-level perspective on the relationship between African Americans, the Republican Party, and political and social reformers, but the implications of this study reach beyond one city to shed light on a nationwide effort to degrade and diminish black citizenship. I argue that black citizenship was constructed as alien and foreign in the urban North in the last decades of the nineteenth century and that this process operated in tension with and undermined the efforts of black Philadelphians to gain traction on their exercise of the franchise. For black Philadelphians at the end of the nineteenth century, the franchise did not seem doomed or secure anywhere in the nation.
    [Show full text]
  • Archival Expert Assignment Sheet
    Melissa Range Lawrence University [email protected] Archival expert assignment sheet This term, you will be in charge of leading one class as the “archival expert.” Your assignment is simple: I want you to read nineteenth century newspapers published by African American editors. Using two of the library’s electronic databases—African American Newspapers and/or Accessible Archives—you will make use of digital archives to provide historical context for the day’s reading. Here’s what to do for prep work, step by step: • On the date you’re signed up to be the archival expert, look at when the writer published their works. (So, for example: Frances Ellen Watkins Harper published Poems on Miscellaneous Subjects in 1855.) • Determine a location that is relevant to the writer, if possible. For Harper, this could be Baltimore (where she grew up), Philadelphia (where she lived and worked as an adult), or Boston (where she frequently lectured). • Now choose a newspaper that is relevant to the date and the location of the poet. If you want to get even more specific, you can (for example, you could look at an abolitionist newspaper for Harper). If you can find one, you can also choose a newspaper where the writer published. • Select an issue of the newspaper and read the whole thing: news, editorials, poetry, even the advertisements. (Be forewarned, the print is tiny and there’s a lot of text.) As you read, make note of anything at all—newspaper poems, news items, even weather—that you feel gives interesting context to the work the class will be discussing.
    [Show full text]
  • In 1848 the Slave-Turned-Abolitionist Frederick Douglass Wrote In
    The Union LeagUe, BLack Leaders, and The recrUiTmenT of PhiLadeLPhia’s african american civiL War regimenTs Andrew T. Tremel n 1848 the slave-turned-abolitionist Frederick Douglass wrote in Ithe National Anti-Slavery Standard newspaper that Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, “more than any other [city] in our land, holds the destiny of our people.”1 Yet Douglass was also one of the biggest critics of the city’s treatment of its black citizens. He penned a censure in 1862: “There is not perhaps anywhere to be found a city in which prejudice against color is more rampant than Philadelphia.”2 There were a number of other critics. On March 4, 1863, the Christian Recorder, the official organ of the African Methodist Episcopal (AME) Church, commented after race riots in Detroit, “Even here, in the city of Philadelphia, in many places it is almost impossible for a respectable colored per- son to walk the streets without being assaulted.”3 To be sure, Philadelphia’s early residents showed some mod- erate sympathy with black citizens, especially through the Pennsylvania Abolition Society, but as the nineteenth century progressed, Philadelphia witnessed increased racial tension and a number of riots. In 1848 Douglass wrote in response to these pennsylvania history: a journal of mid-atlantic studies, vol. 80, no. 1, 2013. Copyright © 2013 The Pennsylvania Historical Association This content downloaded from 128.118.152.206 on Wed, 09 Jan 2019 20:56:18 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms pennsylvania history attitudes, “The Philadelphians were apathetic and neglectful of their duty to the black community as a whole.” The 1850s became a period of adjustment for the antislavery movement.
    [Show full text]
  • Roads Lead to San Francisco: Black Californian Networks of Community and the Struggle for Equality, 1849-1877
    All Roads Lead to San Francisco: Black Californian Networks of Community and the Struggle for Equality, 1849-1877 By Eunsun Celeste Han B. A., Seoul National University, 2009 M. A., Brown University, 2010 Dissertation Submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy in the Department of History at Brown University PROVIDENCE, RHODE ISLAND MAY 2015 © Copyright 2015 by Eunsun Celeste Han This dissertation by Eunsun Celeste Han is accepted in its present form by the Department of History as satisfying the dissertation requirement for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy. Date Michael Vorenberg, Advisor Recommended to the Graduate Council Date Françoise Hamlin, Reader Date Evelyn Brooks Higginbotham, Reader Approved by the Graduate Council Date Peter M. Weber, Dean of the Graduate School iii CURRICULUM VITAE Date of Birth: April 11, 1986, Junjoo, Jeollabuk-do, South Korea EDUCATION Ph.D., History, May, 2015 Brown University, Providence, Rhode Island M.A., History, May, 2010 Brown University, Providence, Rhode Island B.A., Western History, Feb., 2009 summa cum laude, Seoul National University, Seoul, Republic of Korea QUALIFYING FIELDS Nineteenth-Century U. S. History African American History Colonial Latin American History PUBLICATIONS Eunsun Celeste Han, “Making a Black Pacific: Black Californians and Transpacific Community Networks in the Mid-Nineteenth Century,” under review at The Journal of African American History (2015). HONORS AND FELLOWSHIPS W. M. Keck Foundation Fellow at the Huntington, July-August, 2013 The Huntington Library, San Marino, California William G. McLoughlin Travel Fund, October, 2012 Brown University Department of History fund for research and conference travels William G.
    [Show full text]
  • Legislation Especially for the Negro?
    Wycoff: LEGISLATION ESPECIALLY FOR THE NEGRO? THE BLACK PRESS RESPONDS TO LEGISLATION ESPECIALLY FOR THE NEGRO? THE BLACK PRESS RESPONDS TO EARLY SUPREME COURT CIVIL RIGHTS DECISIONS David Wycofft I. INTRODUCTION ....................... 2. We object to being put on a level with II. THE FOURTEENTH AND FIFTEENTH them ............................. 68 AMENDMENTS BECOME BUT HIDEOUS VII. CONCLUSION .......................... 71 M O CKERIES ............................ III. EARNESTLY DISCUSSING THE I. INTRODUCTION DECISIO NS ............................. The years 1873-1883 form perhaps the most im- IV. FEDERALISM ........................... portant decade in United States constitutional history.' A. PRESERVING THE MAIN FEATURES OF In the course of deciding a steady stream of cases in- THE GENERAL SYSTEM ................ volving the Thirteenth, Fourteenth and Fifteenth B. THE CAUSE OF ALL OUR WOES ....... amendments, 2 the Supreme Court laid the basis for the V. CLASS LEGISLATION ................... next century of the constitutional law of civil rights and VI. CLASS LEGISLATION IN THE BLACK civil liberties. Unfortunately, it was a "dreadful dec- PR E SS .................................. ade." In decision after decision, the Court struck down A. THE BANE OF THE NEGRO Is federal laws designed to protect civil rights and civil lib- LEGISLATION ESPECIALLY FOR THE erties, and devitalized the new amendments. N EGRO .............................. These early civil rights decisions of the United B. The Negro Is A Citizen And Must Be States Supreme Court provoked a significant response Protected ............................ in the African American community. Discussion of the 1. The same rights as are enjoyed by other decisions, especially the Civil Rights Cases (1883), was 4a people ............................ major theme in the African American press of the time. t Law Clerk, Honorable James T.
    [Show full text]
  • The Slave Past in the Present Ana Lucia Araujo
    Living History Living History: Encountering the Memory of the Heirs of Slavery Edited by Ana Lucia Araujo Living History: Encountering the Memory of the Heirs of Slavery, Edited by Ana Lucia Araujo This book first published 2009 Cambridge Scholars Publishing 12 Back Chapman Street, Newcastle upon Tyne, NE6 2XX, UK British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library Copyright © 2009 by Ana Lucia Araujo and contributors All rights for this book reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the copyright owner. ISBN (10): 1-4438-0998-5, ISBN (13): 978-1-4438-0998-6 TABLE OF CONTENTS List of Figures............................................................................................ vii List of Tables............................................................................................... x Acknowledgements .................................................................................... xi Introduction ................................................................................................. 1 The Slave Past in the Present Ana Lucia Araujo Chapter One................................................................................................. 8 “According to my Reckoning”: Remembering and Observing Slavery and Emancipation Leslie A. Schwalm Chapter Two.............................................................................................
    [Show full text]
  • Information to Users
    INFORMATION TO USERS This manuscript has been reproduced from the microfilm master. UMI films the text directly from the original or copy submitted. Thus, some thesis and dissertation copies are in typewriter face, while others may be from any type of computer printer. The quality of this reproduction is dependent upon the quality of the copy submitted. Broken or indistinct print, colored or poor quality illustrations and photographs, print bleedthrough,margins, substandard and improper alignment can adversely affect reproduction. In the unlikely event that the author did not send UMI a complete manuscript and there are missing pages, these will be noted. Also, if unauthorized copyright material had to be removed, a note will indicate the deletion. Oversize materials (e.g., maps, drawings, charts) are reproduced by sectioning the original, beginning at the upper left-hand corner and continuing from left to right in equal sections with small overlaps. Each original is also photographed in one exposure and is included in reduced form at the back of the book. Photographs included in the original manuscript have been reproduced xerographically in this copy. Higher quality 6" x 9" black and white photographic prints are available for any photographs or illustrations appearing in this copy for an additional charge. Contact UMI directly to order. UMI University Microfilms International A Bell & Howell Information Company 300 Nortti Zeeb Road. Ann Arbor, Ml 48106-1346 USA 313,'761-4700 800/521-0600 Order Number 9401306 A quest for self-determination: The African Methodist Episcopal church during the age of imperialism, 1884-1916 Little, Lawrence S., Ph.D.
    [Show full text]
  • Raising Her Voice: African-American Women Journalists Who Changed History
    University of Kentucky UKnowledge African American Studies Race, Ethnicity, and Post-Colonial Studies 1994 Raising Her Voice: African-American Women Journalists Who Changed History Rodger Streitmatter Click here to let us know how access to this document benefits ou.y Thanks to the University of Kentucky Libraries and the University Press of Kentucky, this book is freely available to current faculty, students, and staff at the University of Kentucky. Find other University of Kentucky Books at uknowledge.uky.edu/upk. For more information, please contact UKnowledge at [email protected]. Recommended Citation Streitmatter, Rodger, "Raising Her Voice: African-American Women Journalists Who Changed History" (1994). African American Studies. 7. https://uknowledge.uky.edu/upk_african_american_studies/7 RAISING HER VOICE This page intentionally left blank RAISING HER VOICE African-American Women Journalists Who Changed History Rodger Streitmatter THE UNIVERSITY PRESS OF KENTUCKY Copyright © 1994 by The University Press of Kentucky Scholarly publisher for the Commonwealth, serving Bellarmine University, Berea College, Centre College of Kentucky, Eastern Kentucky University, The Filson Historical Society, Georgetown College, Kentucky Historical Society, Kentucky State University, Morehead State University, Murray State University, Northern Kentucky University, Transylvania University, University of Kentucky, University of Louisville, and Western Kentucky University. All rights reserved. Editorial and Sales Offices: The University Press of Kentucky 663 South Limestone Street, Lexington, Kentucky 40508-4008 www.kentuckypress.com PHOTO CREDITS: Maria W. Stewart (woodcut, which appeared with Stewart’s essays in the Liberator, reprinted by permission of the Houghton Library, Harvard University). Mary Ann Shadd Cary (reprinted from Elizabeth Lindsay Davis, Lifting as They Climb[Washington: National Association of Colored Women, 1933]).
    [Show full text]
  • Dr. VP Franklin, Chairperson Dr. Molly Mcgarry Dr
    UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA RIVERSIDE African Americans and the Spanish-American War and Philippine Insurrection: Military Participation, Recognition, and Memory, 1898-1904 Doctor of Philosophy in History by Timothy Dale Russell June 2013 Dissertation Committee: Dr. V.P. Franklin, Chairperson Dr. Molly McGarry Dr. Rebecca Kugel Copyright by Timothy Dale Russell 2013 The Dissertation of Timothy Dale Russell is approved: Committee Chairperson University of California, Riverside ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I would like to express my deepest gratitude to my advisor, Dr. V. P. Franklin, without whose direction and invaluable assistance this dissertation would not have been possible. Thank you for providing the wisdom, patience, and expertise that guided me through this endeavor. I would also like to thank my committee members, Dr. Rebecca Kugel and Dr. Molly McGarry, for their mentorship and support through the years. I would like to thank my loving wife Vera, my parents Mike and Betty Russell, and Peter and Sheila Woodington, for their constant support and encouragement as I labored through the dissertation process. Thank you for providing the foundation and stability that kept me buoyed and focused on achieving this goal. I would also like to offer my heartfelt appreciation to Lance Eisenhauer, Jon Ille, and Dr. Owen Jones, who were always ready to lend a welcome ear and offer kind advice. Thank you for your friendship, I will cherish it always. Finally, I wish to take a moment to remember those dear family members who I have lost in the past year, and whose influence I will carry with me always. My grandparents, Ezra and Bettie Ellis, whose example and life lessons taught me the meaning of facing and overcoming life’s challenges, thank you.
    [Show full text]
  • FINDING AID FOR: George A. Singleton Collection
    FINDING AID FOR: George A. Singleton Collection Prepared By: Shanee' Yvette Murrain Ciana Ayenu Collection Description Collection #: A003 Collection Title: George A. Singleton Collection Creator: George A. Singleton Location: Inclusive Dates: Bulk Dates: Extent: Restrictions: No Assoc Coll Matl: Hist/Bio Note: Scope: Notes: Topic: Geographic: Personal: Corporate: Arrangement: Container List Series Descriptions Series: I: Correspondence Location: History: Scope: Inclusive Dates: Arrangement: Notes: Extent: Series Container List Collection/Series #: A003 /I File Unit: 1-01 CORRESPONDENCE Alexander Joseph Allen, 1939-1946 1-02 CORRESPONDENCE American Red Cross, 1952 1-03 CORRESPONDENCE George W. Baber, 1938-1939 1-04 CORRESPONDENCE Boston University School of Theology, 1923-1956 1-05 CORRESPONDENCE C. J. Chauncey, 1962-1968 1-06 CORRESPONDENCE Thomas Jefferson Clement, 1938-1954 1-07 CORRESPONDENCE Henry Mansfield Collins, 1939-1946 1-08 CORRESPONDENCE Jay Cooke, 1938-1940 1-09 CORRESPONDENCE Carey A. Gibbs, 1939 1-10 CORRESPONDENCE Shirley Graham Du Bois, 1953-1960 1-11 CORRESPONDENCE Farmer, Denney & Leftwich Law Offices, 1940 1-12 CORRESPONDENCE S. L. Greene, 1952-1958 1-13 CORRESPONDENCE J. McKenzie Harrison, 1939 1-14 CORRESPONDENCE John R. Hawkins, 1939 1-15 CORRESPONDENCE V. C. Hodges, 1940 1-16 CORRESPONDENCE William Henry Huff, 1940 1-17 CORRESPONDENCE Lucy M. Hughes, 1939 1-18 CORRESPONDENCE John Hurst, 1925 1-19 CORRESPONDENCE A. S. Jackson, 1938-1939 1-20 CORRESPONDENCE M. E. Jackson, 1938 1-21 CORRESPONDENCE Cecil D. Jones, 1963 1-22 CORRESPONDENCE W. A. Lewis, 1939-1941 1-23 CORRESPONDENCE Albert Long, 1938-1942 1-24 CORRESPONDENCE Lutrelle G. Long, 1943-1956 1-25 CORRESPONDENCE R.
    [Show full text]
  • The Rise of the African American Church in Philadelphia, 1787-1949
    The Preservation Alliance for Greater Philadelphia is the sole owner of the following written and graphic material which cannot be disseminated or reproduced without the prior written approval of the Preservation Alliance. Contact: 215-546-1146 x 2. FROM REFUGE TO STRENGTH: THE RISE OF THE AFRICAN AMERICAN CHURCH IN PHILADELPHIA, 1787-1949 Matthew S. Hopper Preservation Alliance for Greater Philadelphia INTRODUCTION: Philadelphia has been a center of African American religious activity for more than two centuries, and much of its history and tradition has been preserved in Philadelphia’s historic African American religious buildings. Today there are nearly 100 church buildings of vital historic significance within Philadelphia’s city limits, several of which have been occupied by more than one historic African American congregation. Some of these church buildings were built by blacK congregations in times of intense racial prejudice or economic insecurity and stand today as monuments to the growing strength and solidarity of Philadelphia’s African American church. Other church buildings were purchased from previous owners, most often formerly wealthy white congregations. These buildings demonstrate the Church’s increasing economic power as well as Philadelphia’s evolving ethnic and religious demography. Both types of buildings help tell the story of the developing African American community in Philadelphia and, on a larger scale, the wider African American religious experience from colonial times to the present. The story told by Philadelphia’s historic African American church buildings is a story of the changing role of the blacK church in the city. Philadelphia’s first black churches emerged in the late 18th century as products of genuine Christian sentiment among several of the city’s blacK leaders, coupled with frustration with the hypocrisy of racism that blacK congregants experienced from predominantly white congregations and a need for community networKs with which to survive in an aggressive, racially-divided city.
    [Show full text]