A celebration of N.O.history-making women
10th February 2020 · 0 Comments
In honor of Black History Month, The Louisiana Weekly is this week illuminating, celebrating, and commemorating women from New Orleans who are history makers.
EDUCATORS
Sylvanie Francoz Williams, an African-American educator and clubwoman, was born in New Orleans. Williams wrote a report on the educational, economic, and cultural conditions of Black residents of New Orleans and presented it at the World’s Columbian Exposition in Chicago in 1893. She worked as a school administrator and principal of the Fisk School Girls’ Department and later at the Thomy Lafon School. The latter school was burned down during rioting in 1900 but rebuilt under her leadership. Among her students was A. P. Tureaud, a prominent civil rights lawyer.
Williams was founder and president of the Phillis Wheatley Club, a prominent organization for Black women in New Orleans. The club sponsored a nursing school, a hospital, and a free clinic for African Americans in New Orleans. They also conducted sewing bees to make clothing for orphans. Williams was also active in creating the first public playground for African-American children in New Orleans and served as a vice president of the National Association of Colored Women’s Clubs (NACW) when it was founded in 1896.
Williams supported women’s suffrage, including Black women’s suffrage. In 1903, she attempted to attend the annual meeting of the National American Women’s Suffrage Association (NAWSA), when it was held in New Orleans, but was barred because of her race. Instead, Williams welcomed a visit to the Phillis Wheatley Club from white suffrage leader Susan B. Anthony, and she spoke with Anthony about the place of Black women in the suffrage movement.
The Martinez Kindergarten School was founded by Mildred Bernard Martinez, in 1934, after she was forced to resign her teaching position in the New Orleans Public School system following her marriage to Maurice Martinez Sr. Martinez was the first private pre-Kindergarten school in New Orleans. Notable alumni of the school include jazz musician Wynton Marsalis, New Orleans Mayor Sidney Barthelemy, Atlanta Mayor and United Nations Ambassador Andrew Young, and others.
Millie Ruth McClelland Charles founded the SUNO School of Social Work. Her commitment to social work education is evident by her advocacy to establish a nationwide bachelor’s of social work degree (BSW) in and her contributions as a Council of Social Work Education (CSWE) accreditation reviewer. She also is a founding member of the New Orleans Chapter of the National Association of Black Social Workers (NABSW). Charles was honored by the U.S. Congress in 2019 and SUNO established the Millie M. Charles School of Social Work building to commemorate her achievements.
POLITICS
Sybil Haydel Morial is the first African-American “First Lady” of New Orleans. Her husband, Ernest N. “Dutch” Morial was the city first African-American mayor. This mother of five children was much more than a wife and mother. She is an author, educator, filmmaker, activist, and community leader. Morial and three other African American women founded the Louisiana League of Good Government, when they were refused membership in the League of Women Voters. LLOGG held voter registration drives.
She is a founder of the Amistad Research Center in New Orleans and the creator of Symphony in Black, a project that featured Black musicians and conductors to attract black audiences to the New Orleans Symphony. While Associate Dean of the Drexel Center at Xavier University, Morial produced “A House Divided,” a documentary that explores the history of desegregation through the eyes of the people who made civil rights history in our city. The one-hour movie was narrated by actor James Earl Jones. As president and chair of the I’ve Known Rivers Afro-American Pavilion at the Louisiana World Exposition, Morial was the first African-American woman to oversee the building and operations of an attraction of such magnitude. Morial’s recent book Witness to Change: From Jim Crow to Empowerment details her lifelong fight against segregation and racism in New Orleans. “It is a book about heroes, written by one,” says Henry Louis Gates, Jr., Morial, he says, was more than a “witness”—“This charming, gritty gentle-woman was on the front lines in challenging a segregated South.”
Dorothy Mae DeLavallade Taylor was a longtime civil rights advocate before she was elected as the first African-American woman on the New Orleans City Council in 1986. Taylor was an educator and the first African-American woman to be elected to the Louisiana House of Representatives. A fiery no nonsense legislator, Taylor took on the old guard in New Orleans and pushed for integration of the city’s oldest Mardi Gras krewes, which took advantage of city services paid for by city residents, the majority of whom are African-Americans.
Louisiana State Supreme Court Chief Justice Bernette Joshua Johnson was the first African-American woman Associate Justice elected to the state’s highest Court and the first African-American Chief Justice in the court’s 179 years of existence. Johnson is over the state’s lower courts and the affairs of the LSC, and the six Republican white male Associate Justices who also sit on the bench.
New Orleans Mayor LaToya Cantrell is the first woman and first African-American woman elected Mayor of New Orleans. Once in office, she established a new Office of Youth and Families, with a strategic plan to address families in crisis in the city; a Gun Violence Reduction Council tasked with finding solutions to violent crime; and Cantrell launched the city’s first #fairshare initiative to improve city infrastructure, public transportation, and public parks and green spaces. As part of that initiative, in October 2018 the City of New Orleans filed a lawsuit against four opioid manufactures and distributors.
Joan Armstrong was the first woman and first African-American woman to serve as a Judge of the Louisiana Court of Appeals.
Nannette Jolivette Brown was the first African-American woman Judge of the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Louisiana.
Diana E. Bajoie became the first woman and African-American woman to take the oath as the President Pro Tempore of the Louisiana State Senate. She was first elected to the state legislature in 1976 and since served in both houses in Baton Rouge. Bajoie founded the Louisiana Legislative Black Caucus and the Louisiana Legislative Women’s Caucus.
Kim M. Boyle was the first African-American female woman serve as the president of the Louisiana State Bar Association.
Alanah Odoms Hebert is the first African-American woman to become director of the ACLU of Louisiana.
MEDICINE
Emma Wakefield-Paillet, M.D. was the first Black woman to earn a medical degree in Louisiana and to practice medicine in the state. Dr. Wakefield-Paillet graduated with honors from the Medical Department of New Orleans University in 1897 and received her Louisiana medical license in 1897. By 1898 she had opened her medical practice in New Orleans, La. making her the first Black woman to practice medicine in New Orleans.
RELIGION
Venerable Mother Henriette Díaz DeLille was a Louisiana Creole of color from New Orleans, La., who founded the Roman Catholic order of the Sisters of the Holy Family in that city. Composed of free women of color, the order provided nursing care and a home for orphans. Today, Mother DeLille’s legacy lives on at St. Mary’s Academy, a Catholic school founded by the Sisters of the Holy Family.
CIVIL RIGHTS LEADERS
Katie Wickham, a member of the NAACP in the 1940s, was the first chair of the Metropolitan Women’s Voters League. The owner and operator of Katie’s School Beauty Culture and Barbering led voter registration campaigns and worked in the Modern Civil Rights Movement.
Oretha Castle Haley and her sister Doris Castle were among the first women to be deeply involved in the Civil Rights Movement in 1960s New Orleans. Oretha Castle Haley Oretha Castle’s home served as the New Orleans headquarters for the Freedom Riders. With help from mother Virgie their home housed and fed hundreds of Freedom Riders coming and going throughout the summer. Oretha helped to found a local chapter of CORE. She was arrested at several protests and sit-ins. Doris Castle was arrested with the Rev. Avery Alexander during a sit-in to integrate New Orleans’ City Hall cafeteria.
Doratha “Dodie” Smith-Simmons was a member of the NAACP Youth Council and an early member of the New Orleans chapter of the Congress of Racial Equality (CORE) and a participant in the Freedom Rides of 1961.
Dyan French Cole, widely known as “Mama D,” was a trailblazer. In January 1975, she became the first woman to become president of the New Orleans branch of the NAACP. After Hurricane Katrina, when she refused to evacuate, Cole organized crews she called the Soul Patrol, to go through her native 7th Ward and other neighborhoods, saving people, feeding them and finding them clothes, assistance and other relief. She housed so many people at her home on North Dorgenois Street that some people referred to it as Recovery Camp Dorgenois. In December 2005, Cole testified in front of a congressional committee investigating the response to Katrina a few months before. In her rambling but pointed way, she told the committee what had gone wrong.
Barbara Major began organizing while living in the Desire housing projects. The community organizer led the effort to get residents a place at the table for the St. Thomas Public Housing Redevelopment plan. Major later became the main plaintiff in Major v Treen, a lawsuit that challenged the state’s congressional redistricting plan and led to the creation of a Congressional District for New Orleans residents.
Barbara Jackson was the first president of the St. Thomas Resident Council. She and fellow tenant, Fannie McKnight worked across the city and the nation on a long list of civil rights and quality-of-life issues: voting rights, police fairness, housing, health care, job training and employment, reproductive health and campaigns to curb hunger, poverty and over-incarceration.
Cynthia A. Wiggins was the first president of the Guste Homes Resident Council. She became president of the Citywide Tenant Association of New Orleans, before taking on the role as president/CEO of the Guste Homes Resident Management Corporation and president of the National Association of Resident Management Corporations. In conjunction with her peers, they incorporated over 300 Resident Management Corporations throughout the United States.
Viola Francois Washington was the first African-American civil rights activist to launch an organization to help New Orleans’ poor. As founder and executive director of the Welfare Rights Organization, Washington has worked to create jobs and to protect the rights of poor people for the past 40 years.
ARTISTS
Artist and art historian Samella Lewis is renowned for her contributions to African American art and art history. Born on February 27, 1924, in New Orleans, La., Lewis’s heritage led her to view art as an essential expression of the community and its struggles. Lewis began her art career as a student at Dillard University, where she was instructed by the African American sculptor Elizabeth Catlett.
Janee Michelle (Geneva Leona Mercadel) also known as Gee Tucker is the first African-American woman from New Orleans to reach national acclaim in film and television roles in the 20th Century. She is an actress, model, dancer, and business person, best known for her role in the horror film The House on Skull Mountain. Janee Michelle’s career has included appearances in films, television programs and commercials, theatrical productions, and print advertisements. Mercadel made her first film appearance in the 1964 short film “The Legend of Jimmy Blue Eyes.”
Carol Bebelle (a.k.a. Akua Wambui) was the first African-American woman to establish a major arts institution, the Ashé Cultural Arts Center, with artist Douglas Redd. Bebelle is a published poet and writer. She has to her credit a book of original poetry “In a Manner of Speaking,” is presented among other New Orleans writers in the Anthology “From a Bend in the River”
“Sweet Emma” Barrett was a self -taught jazz pianist and singer who worked with the Original Tuxedo Orchestra under Papa Celestin, then William Ridgely. She also worked with Armand Piron, John Robichaux, Sidney Desvigne, and she was the first African-American woman to perform with the Preservation Hall Jazz Band. The Preservation Hall Jazz Band made a brief appearance in the 1965 film The Cincinnati Kid, which featured Barrett as vocalist and pianist for the band and included a close-up of her.
Germaine Bazzle, New Orleans’ First Lady of Jazz grew up in a musical family and began playing the piano by ear at a young age. Bazzle is a recording artist and performer. She also worked as a choir and music appreciation teacher at Xavier Prep, from which she is retired.
To the world she was known as the “Queen of Gospel” but Mahalia Jackson was New Orleans’ First Lady of Gospel. She was the most influential gospel singer in the world and heralded internationally as a singer and civil rights activist. She was born in the Black Pearl section of the Carrollton neighborhood of uptown New Orleans. In 1950, Jackson became the first gospel singer to perform at Carnegie Hall. She also sang at the March on Washington in 1963 and she sang “Take My Hand, Precious Lord” at the Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr’s funeral after he was assassinated in 1968. Jackson was once described by entertainer Harry Belafonte as “the single most powerful black woman in the United States.” She recorded about 30 albums (mostly for Columbia Records) during her career, and her 45 rpm records included a dozen “gold” million-sellers.
Louisa “Blue Lu” Barker was an American jazz and blues singer who often sang and performed with her husband, guitarist Danny Barker, a regular of the New Orleans music scene. Barker’s recording of “A Little Bird Told Me” was released by Capitol Records and reached the Billboard chart in 1948.
Joanne Crayton began her career by singing in church choirs and local theaters during the 1970s and 1980s. She adopted “B.J. Crosby” and “Lady BJ” as her professional stage names. Crosby became the first African-American woman from New Orleans to receive a Tony Award nomination in 1995 for Best Featured Actress in a Musical for her work in Broadway’s “Smokey Joe’s Café.” She appeared on the “Smokey Joe’s Cafe” official Broadway album, which won a Grammy Award. Crosby also performed “How Long Has This Been Going On?” at the Royal Albert Hall, “London for Who Could Ask for Anything More?” to mark the centenary year of Ira Gershwin’s birth. Crosby starred as Matron “Mama” Morton in the Broadway revival of “Chicago” and played Ma Reed in the Broadway debut of “One Mo’ Time.” Crosby’s national tours included “Dreamgirls.” In which she played the lead singer Effie. She had guest roles on “Ally McBeal,” “The Cosby Show,” “Family Matters,” “Gimme a Break!,” “Law & Order,” and “Mad About You.” Crosby’s television special, “Lady BJ Sings Lady Day: A Tribute to Billie Holiday,” won a Cable ACE Award.
ENTREPRENEURS
In New Orleans, Dooky Chase’s was the only upscale restaurant that welcomed African-American celebrities during segregation. Edgar “Dooky Chase Jr. and his wife, Leah Chase, ran the family restaurant started by his father and mother. However, Leah Chase became a world-renowned and the first African-American woman to have a Disney movie character based on her life. Princess Tiana, the waitress who wanted to own a restaurant in the animated Disney feature “The Princess and the Frog,” was based on Leah Chase. It was the first African-American princess in a Disney movie. More than a chef, Mrs. Chase fed freedom riders and championed civil rights and voting rights. She also fed acclaimed celebrities and presidents, including George W. Bush and Barack Obama.
Lorraine Sylvester, the namesake of Sweet Lorraine’s Jazz Club convinced her family, who lived on Dumaine Street in Treme, to host “penny parties,” in which all the neighborhood children would pay one cent in exchange for lemonade and entertainment – provided by Lorraine and her sisters, Melvina and Sonja. More than 50 years and a half-dozen family-owned bars and restaurants later, Lorraine Sylvester’s legacy lives on in Sweet Lorraine’s Jazz Club.
Vera Warren-Williams is the founder and owner of Community Book Center, the city’s first African-American owned bookstore. For nearly 30 years the Center has been a gathering place for the community and the host of a variety of programs and activities designed to educate and enlighten a diverse cross-section of New Orleanians. Warren-Williams has a master’s degree in Social Work. Warren-Williams’ mother, George Ethel Warren, was a notable community activist and civil rights leader in the lower Ninth Ward.
Brenda Thornton was the first African-American woman to own and operate a public relations firm in New Orleans. She was a founder/senior editor of the Black Collegian Magazine, produced and hosted the Saturday Review Show on WGNO-TV, staff writer and social editor of The Louisiana Weekly newspaper, producer and panelists of Habari Gani on WVUE-TV, media consultant for Black films.
Glenda McKinley is the founder and president of GMc+ Co., the first integrated communications agency based in New Orleans that has received numerous local, regional and national awards. The agency is headquartered in the Warehouse District and oversees handling the annual Essence Festival. In 2014, McKinley became the CEO of MySelfie Live, an app which allows brands to engage with event attendees in real-time and take their messages into their social media feeds via selfies.
Michelle Gobert is the first African-American woman to be founder and owner of a major graphics company; Image360 Central New Orleans. Gobert opened her first Signs Now Center in New Orleans followed by a Slidell location. She has developed professional graphic solutions for thousands of organizations across Louisiana and the Gulf Coast Region, ranging from small businesses to big-name customers like the NFL, NBA and NHL.
Sevetri Wilson was featured in Black Enterprise in an article entitled “She May Be the First Black Woman In New Orleans To Raise $2 Million In Capital For Her Startup.” In the article, Wilson was lauded for raising $2 million in capital to expand her tech startup, ExemptMeNow, a SaaS platform designed to help nonprofits become exempt and existing nonprofits manage compliance and sustainability efforts.
Editor’s Note: We know this list could not possibly include all the great African-American women in New Orleans who have reached “first” stature. To that end, we ask you, dear readers, to submit the names/accomplishments of others African-American women who are “firsts,” so that we may honor them. Please submit their names and bios to rdh@laweekly.com.
This article originally published in the February 10, 2019 print edition of The Louisiana Weekly newspaper.
