{"id":228,"date":"2016-03-24T10:23:27","date_gmt":"2016-03-24T14:23:27","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/roger-glass.com\/?p=228"},"modified":"2016-03-24T10:23:27","modified_gmt":"2016-03-24T14:23:27","slug":"momma-addie-activist-organizer-spokesperson","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/roger-glass.com\/?p=228","title":{"rendered":"Momma Addie: Activist, Organizer, Spokesperson"},"content":{"rendered":"

From ser\"IMG-008\"<\/a>ving as a spokesperson for \u201ccolored people\u201d in her adopted hometown of Tarrytown, NY, to helping to found a statewide organization for black women, my great grandmother (Momma Addie) was an \u201cactivist\u201d in every sense of the word.<\/p>\n

As these newspaper clippings from the early 1900s show, Momma Addie\u2019s (Mrs. Clarence Jackson) leadership on the local level included advocating for a community center for Tarrytown\u2019s \u201ccolored\u201d residents and chairing the town\u2019s \u201cColored Republican\"tarrytown<\/a> Club.\u201d<\/p>\n

The town\u2019s elected leaders would often turn to Momma Addie for her advice on community and racial matters. According to an early 1900s issue of the Tarrytown Daily News<\/i>, a member of the committee set up to seek solutions to problems associated with the town\u2019s rapid growth, said he \u201cwished Mrs. Clarence Jackson, a member of the colored race and respected by both races, would give her views on the subject.”<\/p>\n

Momma Addie used the opportunity to advocate for the needs of Tarrytown\u2019s black community. “There<\/i>\"tarrytown<\/a> is no recreation for colored boys and girls in Tarrytown. The Civic League does wonderful<\/i> work, but outside of that there is no means of recreation for us,” she told the committee.<\/i><\/p>\n

In 1914, Momma Addie would be elected the first\u00a0president of Tarrytown’s fledgling Colored Community Center. The local newspaper called the establishment of the center “a long felt need among colored people for years.\u201d<\/p>\n

It should come as no surprise that Momma Addie and her contemporaries were Republicans. During the early 1900s, most blacks supported what was widely known as \u201cthe party of Lincoln.\u201d As a Republican Party activist, Momma Addie helped organize forums to discuss the presidential candidacies of Herbert Hoover and Calvin Coolidge.<\/p>\n

Writing in a 2013 issue of Politico<\/i> magazine, Kurt Schmoke, the former mayor of Baltimore and the former dean of the Howard University School of Law, discussed President Coolidge\u2019s speech to the 1924 Howard University Commencement\u2014and its impact on civil rights.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe 30th president, Republican Calvin Coolidge, was a major supporter of Howard University and an overlooked figure in advancing the cause of racial equality in the United States,\u201d Schmoke wrote.<\/p>\n

Here is a segment of Coolidge\u2019s commencement speech: \u201cThe nation has need of all that can be contributed to it through the best efforts of all its citizens. The colored people have repeatedly proved their devotion to the high ideals of our country. They gave their services in the war with the same patriotism and readiness that other citizens did \u2026. The propaganda of prejudice and hatred which sought to keep the colored men from supporting the national cause completely failed.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

From serving as a spokesperson for \u201ccolored people\u201d in her adopted hometown of Tarrytown, NY, to helping to found a statewide organization for black women, my great grandmother (Momma Addie) was an \u201cactivist\u201d in every sense of the word. As … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[33,31,32,6],"class_list":["post-228","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-calvin-coolidge","tag-civil-rights","tag-colored-republicans","tag-tarrytown"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/roger-glass.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/228","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/roger-glass.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/roger-glass.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/roger-glass.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/roger-glass.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=228"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/roger-glass.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/228\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":234,"href":"https:\/\/roger-glass.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/228\/revisions\/234"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/roger-glass.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=228"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/roger-glass.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=228"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/roger-glass.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=228"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}