Dedicated to the National Association of Colored Women and Their Role in African-American History
This article was written by James Spady and published in ScoopUSA Newspaper in March 2017. Spady’s ability to research and reveal African American historical facts is unmatched, and we are blessed to have these articles in our catalogs so we can con- tinue to tell our stories and create our own narrative based on historical facts.
“The high point of my latest sojourn in England was my visit with Haile Selassie I, Elect of God, King of Kings, the Conquering Lion from the Tribe of Judah, emperor of Ethiopia. He was living in Bath, about an hour and a half’s ride by train from London, on a beautiful estate located on an elevation in the suburb of the city. The attendants were expecting me and ushered me immediately into the room where his majesty received his visitors. Promptly at 4 o’clock Haile Selassie appeared and greeted me cordially. As soon as the preliminary was over, I sat down. Not being accustomed to being ushered into the presence of emperors and kings, I am not at all sure this was the proper caper. Everybody else who came into the room remained standing.” Mary Church Terrell
A Woman of Achievement
The subject of this Women’s History Month article is Mary Church Terrell, a woman of achievement measured by any objective standard. Her vivid descrip- tion of a special meeting with His Imperial Majesty is unique in the annals of history.
In a pre-Geertzian thick description, she provided the following insight: “Haile Selassie looks like an aristocrat from his head to his heels. He really looks like a king and much younger and more handsome than his pictures represent him to be. He conversed with me in French. I do not know whether he spoke English or not. But French is the language used in most of the foreign courts, and I presume he prefers to use it when- ever he can. I did not tear a passion to tatters, but I told Haile Selassie that right-minded, justice-loving people all over the world considered Italy a highway robber, sympathized with Ethiopia, and hoped that someday, somehow, justice would triumph in the end.”
Being Offered the Job of Registrar at Oberlin College in 1891
Mary Church Terrell spent a lifetime assuring that justice comes to her race and gender. Can you imagine a Black woman being offered the position of registrar at Oberlin College in Ohio in 1891? She turned down the offer in order to provide leadership and render service to Black people in the USA at a time when it was direly needed. This is a practice she used throughout her long and distinguished life. Yet, another example of the values she maintained throughout her illustrious and productive life.
Father Shot in Back of His Head During Post Civil War Irish Riot in Memphis
Born in Memphis, Tennessee, in 1863, she lived for 100 years, passing in Annapolis, Maryland, in 1964, a year after the March on Washington. This brilliant Black leader outlived W.E.B. DuBois. A Civil War baby, Mary lived under both civil rights and uncivil wrongs. Her father was a towering example in her life. She described him in these words: “My father was rather reserved in his manner, was rarely familiar with anybody, and had a certain culture which men deprived of educational opportunities, as he was, rarely possess.”
Shedding light on a specific period in American history, Terrell explained: “Shortly after the Civil War, what is commonly called, ‘The Irish Riot,’ occurred in Memphis. During that disturbance, my father was shot in the back of his head at his place of business and left there for dead. He had been warned by friends that he was one of the colored men to be shot. They and my mother begged him not to leave his home that day. But he went to work as usual in spite of the peril he faced. He undoubtedly would have been shot to death if the rioters had not believed they had finished him when he fell to the ground!”
Undaunted, Robert Church went on to become one of the first Black millionaires in the country. In 1906, he founded the Solvent Bank and Trust Company. That was the same year his daughter was re-appointed to the Board of Education in Washington, D.C.
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