Melnea Agnes Cass (née Jones; June 16, 1896 – December 16, 1978) was an American community and

civil rights Civil and political rights are a class of rights that protect individuals' freedom from infringement by governments, social organizations, and private individuals. They ensure one's entitlement to participate in the civil and political life of ...

activist Activism (or Advocacy) consists of efforts to promote, impede, direct or intervene in social, political, economic or environmental reform with the desire to make changes in society toward a perceived greater good. Forms of activism range fro ...

. She was deeply involved in many community projects and volunteer groups in the South End and Roxbury neighborhoods of

Boston Boston (), officially the City of Boston, is the state capital and most populous city of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, as well as the cultural and financial center of the New England region of the United States. It is the 24th- mo ...

and helped found the Boston

local Local may refer to: Geography and transportation * Local (train), a train serving local traffic demand * Local, Missouri, a community in the United States * Local government, a form of public administration, usually the lowest tier of administrat ...

of the

Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters Founded in 1925, The Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters (BSCP) was the first labor organization led by African Americans to receive a charter in the American Federation of Labor (AFL). The BSCP gathered a membership of 18,000 passenger railwa ...

. She was active in the fight to desegregate Boston public schools, as a board member and as president of the Boston chapter of the

National Association for the Advancement of Colored People The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) is a civil rights organization in the United States, formed in 1909 as an interracial endeavor to advance justice for African Americans by a group including W. E. ...

(NAACP). As a young woman, Cass also assisted women with

voter registration In electoral systems, voter registration (or enrollment) is the requirement that a person otherwise eligible to vote must register (or enroll) on an electoral roll, which is usually a prerequisite for being entitled or permitted to vote. The ru ...

after the passage of the Nineteenth Amendment. She was affectionately known as the "First Lady of Roxbury."

Early life

Cass's father was a janitor and her mother a

domestic worker A domestic worker or domestic servant is a person who works within the scope of a residence. The term "domestic service" applies to the equivalent occupational category. In traditional English contexts, such a person was said to be "in service ...

. The family moved to the South End of Boston when Cass was five years old. When Cass was eight, her mother died. Thereafter, she and her sisters were raised by their father and their Aunt Ella, who, as Cass said, "stepped in as a second mother." After a few years their aunt moved the girls to

Newburyport, Massachusetts Newburyport is a coastal city in Essex County, Massachusetts, United States, northeast of Boston. The population was 18,289 at the 2020 census. A historic seaport with vibrant tourism industry, Newburyport includes part of Plum Island. The mo ...

, and placed them in the care of Amy Smith. Cass began her education in the Boston public schools. After graduating from

elementary school A primary school (in Ireland, the United Kingdom, Australia, Trinidad and Tobago, Jamaica, and South Africa), junior school (in Australia), elementary school or grade school (in North America and the Philippines) is a school for primary ed ...

in Newburyport, she attended

Girls' High School Girls High School is a historically and architecturally notable public secondary school building located at 475 Nostrand Avenue in the Bedford–Stuyvesant neighborhood of Brooklyn, New York City. It was built in 1886.''Brooklyn: a soup-to-nuts ...

in Boston for one year. Her aunt then enrolled her in St. Frances de Sales Convent School, a

Catholic school Catholic schools are pre-primary, primary and secondary educational institutions administered under the aegis or in association with the Catholic Church. , the Catholic Church operates the world's largest religious, non-governmental school syste ...

for black and Indian girls in

Rock Castle A rock castle (german: Felsenburg) is a type of medieval castle that directly incorporates natural rock outcrops into its defences to such an extent that the rock formations define the structure of the castle. Topographically, rock castles are c ...

Virginia Virginia, officially the Commonwealth of Virginia, is a state in the Mid-Atlantic and Southeastern regions of the United States, between the Atlantic Coast and the Appalachian Mountains. The geography and climate of the Commonwealth ar ...

. Cass graduated in 1914 as

valedictorian Valedictorian is an academic title for the highest-performing student of a graduating class of an academic institution. The valedictorian is commonly determined by a numerical formula, generally an academic institution's grade point average (GPA ...

of her class. She returned to Boston to the home that her Aunt Ella had established for the girls. Cass looked for work in retail, but finding few opportunities for blacks in Boston, she was instead forced into “domestic” work. She did this type of work until her marriage to Marshall Cass, in December 1917. While her husband was in the service, their first child, Marshall, was born. After his return from the war, they had two other children, Marianne and Melanie. Her husband died in 1958. Cass became involved in community projects. She helped to organize people to register to vote after the Nineteenth Amendment was

ratified Ratification is a principal's approval of an act of its agent that lacked the authority to bind the principal legally. Ratification defines the international act in which a state indicates its consent to be bound to a treaty if the parties inte ...

in 1920. Cass organized black women to cast their first vote. She was involved in women's suffrage activities for the rest of her life. As a young woman, she attended

William Monroe Trotter William Monroe Trotter, sometimes just Monroe Trotter (April 7, 1872 – April 7, 1934), was a newspaper editor and real estate businessman based in Boston, Massachusetts. An activist for African-American civil rights, he was an early opponent o ...

's lectures and protest meetings and was a faithful reader of the ''

Boston Guardian The ''Boston Guardian'' was an African-American newspaper, co-founded by William Monroe Trotter and George W. Forbes in 1901 in Boston, Massachusetts, and published until the 1950s. In April 2016, an unrelated publisher launched its own ''Boston ...

''.

Career

It was in the 1930s that Melnea Cass began a lifetime of volunteer work on the local, state, and national level. She first contributed her services to the Robert Gould Shaw House, a

settlement house The settlement movement was a reformist social movement that began in the 1880s and peaked around the 1920s in United Kingdom and the United States. Its goal was to bring the rich and the poor of society together in both physical proximity and s ...

and community center. She was the founder of the Kindergarten Mothers. Her community activities over the years were numerous and varied: Pansy Embroidery Club,

Harriet Tubman Harriet Tubman (born Araminta Ross, March 10, 1913) was an American abolitionist and social activist. Born into slavery, Tubman escaped and subsequently made some 13 missions to rescue approximately 70 slaves, including family and friends, us ...

Mothers' Club, and the

Sojourner Truth Sojourner Truth (; born Isabella Baumfree; November 26, 1883) was an American abolitionist of New York Dutch heritage and a women's rights activist. Truth was born into slavery in Swartekill, New York, but escaped with her infant daughter to f ...

Club, worked in the Northeastern Region of the

National Association of Colored Women's Clubs The National Association of Colored Women's Clubs (NACWC) is an American organization that was formed in July 1896 at the First Annual Convention of the National Federation of Afro-American Women in Washington, D.C., United States, by a merger of t ...

as a secretary, helped form the Boston local of the

to name a few. During World War II she was one of the organizers of Women In Community Service, which later became Boston's sponsor of the Job Corps. In 1949 she was a founder and charter member of

Freedom House Freedom House is a non-profit, majority U.S. government funded organization in Washington, D.C., that conducts research and advocacy on democracy, political freedom, and human rights. Freedom House was founded in October 1941, and Wendell Wil ...

, which was conceived by Muriel and Otto Snowden. A year later, Boston Mayor John Collins appointed her as the only female charter member to

Action for Boston Community Development (ABCD) Action for Boston Community Development (ABCD) is an anti-poverty, community development and human services organization founded in 1961 as Boston Community Development Program (BCDP) in Boston, Massachusetts and incorporated as Action for Bosto ...

,"On This Day: June 19, 1968: Melnea Cass"
''Mass Moments'', Massachusetts Foundation for the Humanities. "She was a charter member of Action for Boston Community Development (ABCD), which helped people displaced by urban renewal." which assisted people who lost their homes to urban renewal efforts. From 1962 to 1964, Cass was president of the Boston branch of the

National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) is a civil rights organization in the United States, formed in 1909 as an interracial endeavor to advance justice for African Americans by a group including W. E.&n ...

. From 1975 to 1976, Cass was chairperson for the Massachusetts Advisory Committee for the Elderly. In 1933,

organized a demonstration urging African-American employers to hire African-American workers. Melnea Cass participated; it was her first demonstration. Melnea Cass Boulevard in Boston's Roxbury neighborhood bears her name along with the Massachusetts Department of Conservation and Recreation's (DCR) Melnea A. Cass Swimming Pool and Indoor Recreation Arena dedicated by Gov.

John Volpe John Anthony Volpe (; December 8, 1908November 11, 1994) was an American businessman, diplomat, and politician from Massachusetts. A son of Italian immigrants, he founded and owned a large construction firm. Politically, he was a Republican in i ...

. May 22, 1966, was declared Melnea Cass Day. She received honorary

doctorate A doctorate (from Latin ''docere'', "to teach"), doctor's degree (from Latin ''doctor'', "teacher"), or doctoral degree is an academic degree awarded by universities and some other educational institutions, derived from the ancient formalism ''l ...

s from

Northeastern University Northeastern University (NU) is a private university, private research university with its main campus in Boston. Established in 1898, the university offers undergraduate and graduate programs on its main campus as well as satellite campuses in ...

(June 15, 1969),

Simmons College Institutions of learning called Simmons College or Simmons University include: * Simmons University, a women's liberal arts college in Boston, Massachusetts * Simmons College of Kentucky, a historically black college in Louisville, Kentucky * Har ...

(May 15, 1971), and

Boston College Boston College (BC) is a private Jesuit research university in Chestnut Hill, Massachusetts. Founded in 1863, the university has more than 9,300 full-time undergraduates and nearly 5,000 graduate students. Although Boston College is classifie ...

(1975). Melnea Cass died in 1978. She is commemorated on the

Boston Women's Heritage Trail The Boston Women's Heritage Trail is a series of walking tours in Boston, Massachusetts, leading past sites important to Boston women's history. The tours wind through several neighborhoods, including the Back Bay and Beacon Hill, commemorating w ...

References

External links

* Th
Freedom House Photographs
collection contains images of Melnea Cass (Archives and Special Collections of the Northeastern University Libraries in Boston, MA). {{DEFAULTSORT:Cass, Melnea Cass, Melnea Agnes Cass, Melnea Agnes Activists for African-American civil rights Community organizing People from Boston African-American history in Boston American suffragists African-American suffragists 20th-century African-American women 20th-century African-American people Women civil rights activists Girls' High School (Boston, Massachusetts) alumni

Early life

Career

See also

References

Further reading

External links