FACES: Three Black Women in West Virginia...
In 1928, Minnie Buckingham Harper made U.S. history in West Virginia: she became the first black woman to serve in the state legislature in any state.
Harper was appointed to the West Virginia House of Delegates on January 10, 1928, by Governor Howard Gore to fill a vacancy caused by the death of her husband. She was from Welch, in McDowell County, West Virginia.
Harper was born in Winfield on May 15, 1886, and resided in Keystone much of her life. Until the death of her husband, Minnie Harper had been a housewife. She did not run in the state legislative elections held later that year.
A recent letter to the editor in the Charleston Gazette dated Nov. 26, 1998, stressed Harper's role in West Virginia history and added:
Since 1896, 20 black men and women have served in the West Virginia Legislature up to this election. Of the 20, 10 were from McDowell County.
The letter was singed by Adolphus Young Jr. of Welch.
A document on the history of women available online through West Virginia University's Institute of Public Affairs, The Women Pioneers of the West Virginia State Legislature, 1923-1969 by Jo Boggess Phillips, talks about the success of black politicians in southern West Virginia:
Some may find it surprising that West Virginia, a state that has never had a disproportionately large number of African-Americans, would hold the honor of having the first African-American woman state legislator in the United States. During the early part of this century the southern half of the state, and McDowell County in particular, attracted a relatively large number of African Americans from surrounding states who were looking for work in the coal mines. Although the work was hazardous and hard, the pay was relatively good, especially given the limited career alternatives available to African-American men. By 1920, the state's African-American population had increased to almost 86,000. McDowell County, in particular, had became known as a place where African-Americans could achieve considerable social mobility in an otherwise segregated society (McGehee 1994).
Harper paved the way for others, but it would be more than 20 years before another black woman walked the halls of West Virginia's state legistalure.
In 1950, Elizabeth Simpson Drewry became the first black woman to be elected to the West Virginia Legislature.
Born in 1893, Drewry had come to McDowell County in West Virginia as a young child. By the age of fourteen she was herself a mother. Her husband was Bluefield professor William H. Drewry. He died in 1951 - one year after she took office.
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