When reading Joyce Meyer's The Confidant Woman recently, she mentioned several
remarkable women. One of them I had never heard of, but her story intriqued me, and
as it is Black History Month, I thought spreading her bio would be approrpriate!
MARY McLEOD BETHUNE was born in Mayesville, South Carolina, in 1875, one of
seventeen children of SAMUEL and PATSY McLEOD, Samuel having been given his freedom
from slavery prior to the Civil war. He then worked to raise the funds to purchase his wife
from her slave master. Mary was the fifteenth of seventeen children, most of her brothers
and sisters were born in slavery. Once her family was reassembled from various plantations
after the civil war, her parents acquired five acres of land and built their family home.
Mary had a burning
desire to learn how to read and write, and was not happy until
she was allowed to attend Maysville's one room schoolhouse. McLeod
became
the prize student of the teacher, Emma Jane Wilson, who recognized her
outstanding skills. Miss Wilson recommended McLeod for a
scholarship to attend Scotia Seminary near Concord,
North Carolina. Upon graduation from Scotia in 1894,
McLeod was awarded a scholarship to Dwight Moody's
Institute for Home and Foreign Missions in Chicago.
She had dreamed of going to Africa to minister to
the spiritual and educational needs of her
ancestors, since she was 12 years old. However she was informed that
there were "no openings for Negro
Missionaries in Africa".Mary was transferred by the Presbyterian Board to Kendell Institute in Sumpter, South Carolina. There she continued to teach and render social services. She met Albertus Bethune, a former schoolteacher turned haberdasher. They were married in early May 1898 and she gave birth to Albertus McLeod Bethune Jr.
Mary and son
Albert moved to Daytona, where she opened a cabin school
located on a dump site for $5 down and $5 a month. In 1904 she began her
own
school. Her one room school
became the Daytona Normal and Industrial School for Negro Girls and
taught not only reading and writing, but home economics skills as well.
Her school grew over the years until 1923, when it merged with
Cookman Institute, a school for boys. The merged schools
became known as Bethune-Cookman College, and continued
to be located in Daytona Beach where it
is still in
operation today.
Mary spoke out vehemently when African-American women were not permitted to participate in the national advisory council of the War Department's Women's Interest Section in 1941, going public as well as complaining to the Secretary of War. She also worked behind the scenes with Mrs. Roosevelt, and eventually won the battle to allow African-American women to become officers in the Women's Army Auxiliary Corps established a year later.
After World War II, she was one of three African-American consultants to the U.S. delegation involved in developing the United Nations charter. She received an honorary Doctor of Humanities degree from Rollins College in 1949, the first African-American to receive an honorary degree from a white southern college
In 1974, ninety-nine years to the day after Bethune's birth, she became the first woman and the first African-American to be honored with a statue in a public park in Washington, D.C. The statue, in Lincoln Park, is a reminder of her achievements. South Carolina has honored its native daughter as well, hanging her portrait in the state capitol in Columbia.
Now, did you know all this about this CONFIDANT, MEMORABLE woman? Didn;t think so, but know you do!