First Black Trained Nurse

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First Black Trained Nurse

Mary Eliza Mahoney (1845-1926), acknowledged to be the first Black trained nurse in America, graduated from the New England Hospital for Women and Children, now the Dimock Community Health Center, in 1879. While she was one of the few early Black members of The American Nurses Association, she helped to organize The National Association of Colored Graduate Nurses in 1908.

Source: African Americans in Boston: More Than 350 Years

Media and Political Strategist

In 1986 the Boston Globe called media and political strategist Joyce Ferriabough, the only woman to break into the campaign managers' circle when she guided Charles Yancey's historic run for State Auditor. Regularly quoted in the news media for her views on political trends, especially as they

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Source: African Americans in Boston: More Than 350 Years

Beacon Hill Barbershops

In 19th-century Black Boston, centered on the north slope of Beacon Hill, the local barbershop was an important forum for the discussion of political ideas, the exchange of community information, and the posting of job openings. Peter Howard's shop and John J. Smith's barbershop, both at the foot

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Source: African Americans in Boston: More Than 350 Years

The Fight for School Equality

In 1787 Primus Hall and other Black leaders petitioned the Massachusetts legislature for equal school facilities for Black children.

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Source: African Americans in Boston: More Than 350 Years

First Black Lawyer before Supreme Court

John Sweat Rock (1825-1866), a noted Boston lawyer, became in 1865 the first African-American to practice before the U.S. Supreme Court and the first Black person to speak before the U.S. House of Representatives.

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Source: African Americans in Boston: More Than 350 Years

From 1832 to 1865 the Liberator was a powerful anti-slavery and 'underground' newspaper for Black citizens. Founded and published by the fiery white abolitionist, William Lloyd Garrison, the paper had Black reporters and columnists.

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Source: African Americans in Boston: More Than 350 Years

First Black Church

In December 1806, Rev. Thomas Paul (who had been and 'exhorter' of scripture passages since age sixteen) formally organized and became the first minister of the first Black church in Boston at the African Meeting House on Beacon Hill.

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Source: African Americans in Boston: More Than 350 Years

United Daughters of Zion

The United Daughters of Zion, organized November 6, 1845, was the first women's beneficial group - Black or white - in Boston.

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Source: African Americans in Boston: More Than 350 Years

Black Population 1880-1920

The Boston Black population numbered 2,348 in 1865. By 1880 (after the Civil War), it had climbed to 5,873. Throughout the entire period from the Civil War to World War I, Boston had as large a proportion of African-American residents as New York, Chicago, Detroit, and Cleveland; the Black

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Source: African Americans in Boston: More Than 350 Years

In 1975 Angela Paige Cook with her husband Joseph Cook founded Paige Academy in the Highland Park section of Roxbury. The academy has become a nationally recognized private pre-school and elementary school with the arts and sciences as vital components of the curriculum. As a unique community

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Source: African Americans in Boston: More Than 350 Years

Pauline Hopkins, a Black high school student in Boston, won the first prize of 'ten dollars in gold,' offered by the Congregational Publishing Society of Boston in 1895 for her essay on the 'Evils of Intemperance and Their Remedies.' She went on to become a writer for theColored American

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Source: African Americans in Boston: More Than 350 Years

Freedom Electronics and Engineering

Now more than 20 years old, Freedom Electronics and Engineering was founded by lawyer and businessman Archie Williams during the height of the civil rights movement in Boston in the 1960s. The firm presently supplies products and services for giant high-tech industries such as Digital Equipment

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Source: African Americans in Boston: More Than 350 Years

First Black Psychiatrist

Dr. Solomon Carter Fuller (1872-1953), acknowledged as the first Black to practice psychiatry in America, graduated from Boston University's Medical School in 1897 and practiced psychiatry in Boston and Framingham until 1937.

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Source: African Americans in Boston: More Than 350 Years

Nation of Islam Leader

Minister Louis Farrakhan, raised in Roxbury and a 1950 graduate of English High School, has been the national leader of the Nation of Islam since 1977, following the death of the founder of the Nation, Elijah Muhammad. While viewed by some as controversial, Minister Farrakhan and the Nation of

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Source: African Americans in Boston: More Than 350 Years

South End Electric Company

In 1923 Leon G. Lomax founded the South End Electric Company in Roxbury, a firm which stayed in business until the early 1970s. Lomax also organized and became president of the Greater Boston Negro Business and Trade Association in 1938.

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Source: African Americans in Boston: More Than 350 Years

Massachusetts Legislative Black Caucus

In 1972 the Massachusetts Legislative Black Caucus was founded in an effort to coordinate the efforts of Black elected officials and make them more accountable to the Black community.

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Source: African Americans in Boston: More Than 350 Years

First Elected Black Woman

In 1952 Madeline D. Andrews was elected to the Medford School Committee. She was apparently the first Black woman elected to public office in Massachusetts.

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Source: African Americans in Boston: More Than 350 Years

Female Anti-Slavery Leader

Susan Paul of Boston, daughter of Rev. Thomas Paul, served as vice president of the Second Annual Anti-Slavery Convention of American Women in Philadelphia in 1839.

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Source: African Americans in Boston: More Than 350 Years

In 1787 Prince Hall founded Boston's African Lodge Number 459, the first African Masonic Lodge in the country and the beginning of Black Masonry in the United States. The Lodge, currently located at 18 Washington Street in the Grove Hall section of Dorchester, is one of the few Masonic lodges

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Source: African Americans in Boston: More Than 350 Years

State Housing Board First

In 1959 Frank Morris became the first African-American senior manager of a state agency in the history of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts when he was appointed to the position of director of the State Housing Board. Starting as a junior planner with the Board in 1948, Frank Morris had one of the

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Source: African Americans in Boston: More Than 350 Years

Newspaper Professional

Dexter D. Eure, Sr., completed 25 years of service atThe Boston Globe in 1989. He had started as an assistant to the manager of circulation in 1963 and five years later became an assistant to the editor for urban affairs. For two years he was the only Black American in Boston with a weekly

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Source: African Americans in Boston: More Than 350 Years

Juvenile Garrison Independent Society

In the 1830s and 1840s Black Bostonians were providing for the education and intellectual stimulation of their youth. The Juvenile Garrison Independent Society, mostly teenagers, provided Black history education for themselves and services for the community - sponsoring lectures, community fix-up

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Source: African Americans in Boston: More Than 350 Years

Boston Afro-American Artists, Inc.

The Boston Afro-American Artists, Inc. ( BAAA) - (formerly the Boston Negro Artists Association) - was organized in 1963 by J. Marcus Mitchell and Calvin Burnett to stimulate the development of and appreciation for the visual arts within the Black community. Incorporated in 1966, the BAAA developed

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Source: African Americans in Boston: More Than 350 Years

Charles Street A.M.E. Church

In 1983, Charles Street A.M.E. Church celebrated its 150th anniversary. Founded in 1833 by Boston's 19th-century Black community on Beacon Hill, it moved to its present site in upper Roxbury in 1939, the last Black church to move out of the Beacon Hill area.

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Source: African Americans in Boston: More Than 350 Years

Metropolitan Council for Educational Opportunity

In another approach to upgrading education for Boston's Black students, the Metropolitan Council for Education Opportunity ( METCO) was founded in 1966, and 219 Boston students began attending school in seven suburban communities (Newton, Brookline, Wellesley, Lexington, Lincoln, Arlington, and

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Source: African Americans in Boston: More Than 350 Years

'Birth of a Nation' Protest

In 1915 all of Boston's Black institutions, agencies, and community leaders united to protest the showing of the film, 'Birth of a Nation,' at the Tremont Theater because the film portrayed southern Blacks as depraved and glorified the Ku Klux Klan. Despite the collective protest, the city allowed

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Source: African Americans in Boston: More Than 350 Years

African Society for Mutual Aid and Charity

In 1796 a group of Boston Blacks founded the African Society for Mutual Aid and Charity. The Society provided social-welfare services, financial relief, and job placement to its members and their families.

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Source: African Americans in Boston: More Than 350 Years

First Black School Principal

Maria L. Baldwin of Cambridge became the first Black school principal in Massachusetts when she was appointed to head the Agassiz School in Cambridge in 1899. She remained in the position until 1922.

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Source: African Americans in Boston: More Than 350 Years

TV Executive First

When Donna Latson Gittens was named vice president of community programming for WCVB-TV in 1983, she became the first African-American in the history of local television to assume this executive position and one of a relatively few in the nation.

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Source: African Americans in Boston: More Than 350 Years

Church in Faneuil Hall

While Black people in Boston attended white churches after the American Revolution, increasing incidents of racial discrimination moved them to request the use of Fanueil Hall for religious meetings. Permission was granted in 1789 and the non-denominational prayer services led to the establishment

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Source: African Americans in Boston: More Than 350 Years

In the 1940s and 1950s, at the corner of Massachusetts and Columbus Avenues, stood a landmark in the history of jazz, the Hi-Hat Club. (The new Harriet Tubman House now occupies the site). Originally it was a supper club patronized by whites listening to 'white' music, but the music became

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Source: African Americans in Boston: More Than 350 Years

Literature Facts

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