D14 Virtual Town Hall - Celebrating Black History Month
Our D14 Virtual Town Hall this past week celebrated Black History Month. Dr. Ida Jones, historian and archivist from Morgan State University joined me. She has studied and published works on many of our Black Women leaders in Baltimore. We learned about Victorine Q. Adams, Augusta Chissell and Margaret Gregory Hawkins, Lillie May Carroll Jackson, Verda Welcome with a shout out to Speaker Adrienne Jones. Here is the full video.
Victorine Q. Adams was Baltimore’s first Black woman City Councilmember, serving from 1967-1983 in the old 4th District. She served with Senator Barbara Mikulski and former Councilwoman Mary Pat Clarke. Councilwoman Adams was actually elected as a Delegate from Baltimore City to the General Assembly and then decided she could make a better difference in Baltimore, so she ran for City Council instead, leaving her Delegate post. She was an educator, and she was very concerned about job creation for African American men and women. She founded the Colored Democratic Women’s Campaign Committee where they supported white candidates who helped African American causes in 1946. Then she ran for office herself. She is also the founder of the BGE Baltimore Fuel Fund in 1979 as a councilperson, helping families to this day.
Augusta Chissell and Margaret Gregory Hawkins were leaders in the Suffrage movement in 1915-1920 in Baltimore. Their homes were right next to each to each other on Druid Hill Avenue where you can still see the marker dedicated to their work. They formed the DuBois Circle, holding meetings in their homes to fight for suffrage. They were both educators as well. They felt suffrage, making sure women had the right to vote, was one of the best ways to change the discrimination happening in Baltimore to Black men and women. These suffragists were not allowed in the White women’s movement and formed their own. After women won the right to vote, Ms. Chissell wrote a primer for women voters in the Afro, answering questions about what to do with the vote now that we have it.
Lillie May Carroll Jackson was a civil rights activist and president of the NAACP for 35 years. She was very active in organizing the sit ins and other demonstrations in Baltimore. She’s also the matriarch of the Mitchell family.
Verda Welcome was the first Black woman to serve as a Delegate in the Maryland General Assembly, she was from Baltimore. Three years later in 1962, she became the 1st Black woman elected to serve in the Senate of the Maryland General Assembly and served for 25 years. She was the first Black woman to serve in any state senate in the US and passed significant legislation aimed to end discrimination in the state, allow for mixed race marriages and more. Prior to serving, Welcome was an educator. Senate President Ferguson in 2020 moved her portrait from a Senate office building to the Senate Chamber.
Adrienne Jones is the current Speaker of the Maryland House of Delegates and the first woman and African American to serve in that role. She made modern history and is working hard to address police reform, fund HBCUs and education.
Dr. Jones and I talked a lot about history and ensuring that more people know our history. She is working on a book and curriculum with several other partners about the history of Baltimore, because that seems to be missing from today’s education system.