Mary McLeod Bethune
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Mary McLeod Bethune (born July 10, 1875 in Mayesville , South Carolina , † May 18, 1955 in Daytona Beach , Florida ) was an American women and civil rights activist of African American descent.
Youth and education
McLeod was born the fifteenth of seventeen children of former slaves Samuel and Patsy McLeod. As a child, she helped harvest the cotton fields and did not attend a Presbyterian mission school until the age of eleven . Because of her talent, she received a scholarship to attend Scotia Seminary , a school for African American girls in Concord, North Carolina. After graduating from school in 1894, she attended Dwight Moody's Institute for Home and Foreign Missions in Chicago with the intention of going to Africa as a missionary .
Teaching and school management activity
After her application was rejected, she returned to Mayesville in 1896, where she taught at the Presbyterian school. She then worked at the Haines Institute in Augusta and the Kindell Institute in Sumpter before setting up her own school in Daytona Beach in 1904, the Daytona Literary and Industrial School for Training Negro Girls . Among other things, she managed to win the company Procter & Gamble as a supporter of her school. In 1924 it merged with the Cookman Institute of Jacksonville to form the Bethune-Cookman Collegiate Institute , which was later renamed Bethune-Cookman College (see also Historic African-American Colleges and Universities ). Bethune remained president of the college until 1942.
In addition, she was president of the Central Life Insurance Company of Tampa and director of the Afro-American Life Insurance Company of Jacksonville and the Bethune-Volusia Beach Corporation, which she founded in 1940 .
Activities in the civil rights movement
Bethune was also active in the civil rights movement. As a member of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), she campaigned for the abolition of the Jim Crow laws and was therefore temporarily persecuted by the Ku Klux Klan . From 1924 to 1928 she was president of the National Association of Colored Women ; In 1935 she founded the National Council of Negro Women (NCNW), of which she became president. In 1940 she was also elected President of the NAACP.
In 1936, President Franklin D. Roosevelt named her director of African American affairs and minority affairs commissioner for the National Youth Administration . During World War II, she was an advisor to the US Secretary of War for the selection of the first colored female officer candidates for the Women's Army Corps . In 1944 she became the National Commander of the Women's Army for National Defense .
In 1945, Bethune was sent by President Harry S Truman as an advisor to the founding assembly of the UN . In 1949, its President Dumarsais Estimé awarded the Haitian Medal of Honor and Merit . In 1949 she was named Commander of the Order of the Star of Africa by Liberian President William S. Tubman .
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| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | McLeod Bethune, Mary |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | American woman and civil rights activist |
| DATE OF BIRTH | July 10, 1875 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | Mayesville , South Carolina |
| DATE OF DEATH | May 18, 1955 |
| Place of death | Daytona Beach , Florida |