Mary Church Terrell Leads National Association of Colored Women

Mary Church Terrell, a Oberlin-educated daughter of formerly enslaved parents and one of the first Black women to earn a college degree in the US, became the first president of the NACW in 1896. She was also one of the first Black women appointed to a school board (Washington, D.C., 1895). Her advocacy for Black women's rights and civil equality spanned seven decades.