March is Women’s History Month and a time to celebrate the work, accomplishments, and labor of women from all walks of life and all races. For me, more specifically, it is a time to acknowledge Black Women in particular because we have been overlooked for so many years, even in the early days of the “Women’s Suffrage Movement.” That’s white women who didn’t want us. Not a first. We had to fight to get a seat, even at their table.
While history proves that women, over time, have always played an essential role in the shape that history has taken in many instances, women were still overlooked, more often than not, in history books, just like African Americans. Thank God for women of courage, strength, and faith. They have helped to carry us through good times and bad times.
There are so many amazing women that we could spotlight or salute. As often as possible, even beyond Women’s History Month, we shine the spotlight on amazing women on the pages of the SCOOP Newspaper.
In today’s column, I’m shining the spotlight on some amazing women who founded many very meaningful women’s organizations. Since I am a member of Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority, Inc., America’s first African American sorority founded on the campus of Howard University in 1908, and since the AKAs will converge on Philadelphia, Wednesday, March 8 through Sunday, March 12th, for their regional conference, let me start with a brief history of Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority, Inc.
Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority, Inc. (ΑΚΑ) is the first intercollegiate historically African American sorority. The sorority was founded on January 15, 1908, at the historically black Howard University in Washington, D.C., by a group of sixteen students led by Ethel Hedgeman Lyle. Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority Inc. was created so that African American women who didn’t have the same equal rights or opportunities would one day have them. Forming a sorority broke barriers for African American women in areas where they had little power or authority due to a lack of opportunities for minorities and women in the early 20th century. Alpha Kappa Alpha was incorporated on January 29, 1913.
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Thank you for reading Thera Martin’s article on scoopnewsusa.com. For more on “Celebrating Founders of Powerful Black Women’s Organizations”, please subscribe to SCOOP USA Media. Print subscriptions are $75 and online subscriptions (Print, Digital, and VIZION) are $90. (52 weeks / 1 year).
