| Mary
McLeod Bethune- Life History |
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Mary
McLeod Bethune was born Mary Jane McLeod on July 10, 1875 in Mayesville,
South Carolina. (The picture on the left is of the cabin where she was born.)
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After
being sponsored at a mission school in South Carolina and receiving a scholarship
to Moody Bible Institute, she moved to Daytona Beach in 1904 to begin her
own school. |
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Her
one room school became the Daytona Normal and Industrial School for Negro
Girls and taught not only reading and writing but home economics skills
as well. |
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Her
school grew over the years until 1923 when it merged with Cookman Institute,
a school for boys. The merged schools became known as Bethune-Cookman
College and continued to be located in Daytona Beach where it is in operation
today. |
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Bethune
was active in the fight against racism and served under several Presidents
as a member of the unofficial African American "brain trust."
In 1936 she was appointed by President Roosevelt as the director of the
National Youth Administration's Division of Negro Affairs.
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She
also founded the National Council of Negro Women and was an active member
of the National Association of Colored Women. Bethune died in May
1955. |
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Thirty
years later in 1985, Bethune was recognized as one of the most influential
Afro-American women in the country with a postage stamp issued in her honor
and a statue of her erected in a park in Washington, DC. |
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