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Sarah Jane Woodson Early

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Sarah Jane Woodson Early
BornNovember 15, 1825
Ross County, Ohio, US
DiedAugust 15, 1907 (aged 82)
EducationOberlin College, 1852
Occupations
  • College educator
  • Principal
  • Superintendent
  • Lecturer

Sarah Jane Woodson Early, born Sarah Jane Woodson (November 15, 1825 – August 1907), was an American educator, black nationalist, temperance activist and author. A graduate of Oberlin College, where she majored in classics, she was hired at Wilberforce University in 1858 as the first black woman college instructor, and also the first black American to teach at a historically black college or university (HBCU).[1]

She also taught for many years in community schools. After marrying in 1868 and moving to Tennessee with her minister husband Jordan Winston Early, she was principal of schools in four cities. Early served as national superintendent (1888–1892) of the black division of the Women's Christian Temperance Union (WCTU), and gave more than 100 lectures across five states. She wrote a biography of her husband and his rise from slavery that is included among post-Civil War slave narratives.

Early life and education

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Sarah Jane Woodson, the fifth daughter and youngest child of eleven of Jemima (Riddle) and Thomas Woodson (1790–1879), was born free in Chillicothe, Ohio, on November 15, 1825. Her parents had moved to the free state of Ohio in 1820 after her father purchased the whole family's freedom for $900 (~$27,038 in 2023).[2] They left Greenbrier County, Virginia, where the Woodsons were one of only two free black families in the county.[3]

They founded the first black Methodist church west of the Alleghenies.[3] In 1830, the Woodsons were among the founders of a separate black farming community called Berlin Crossroads. The nearly two dozen families living there by 1840 established their own school, stores and churches. Her father and some brothers became black nationalists, which influenced Sarah Woodson's political views as an adult.[3] Additionally, Berlin Crossroads was a prominent spot on the Underground Railroad, with the Woodson's opening their home to many runaway slaves.[4]

Portrait of Woodson Early, circa 1893

Woodson's father believed that he was the oldest son of Sally Hemings and President Thomas Jefferson; this tradition became part of the family's oral history.[5] According to professional historians, this was not supported by known historical evidence.[6] A 1998 report indicated that tests of DNA samples from the descendants of the Jefferson, Hemings and Woodson male lines showed conclusively that there was no match between the Jefferson and Woodson lines; the Woodson male line did show western European paternal ancestry.[7] The Woodson family rejected the DNA report on ethical grounds, because Dr. Foster had lost control of the testing project that he established, violated promises he had made to DNA donors, and did not know if the report reflected the actual results. To Foster's surprise, individuals who he did not know took control of the public announcement of the DNA report, when he thought it was still a secret. [8] According to historians at Monticello, no documents support the claim that Woodson was Hemings' first child, as he appeared to have been born before any known child of hers. Historian Annette Gordon-Reed failed to report in her Pulitzer-Prize winning book that newsman James Callender named "Tom" as the son of Jefferson and Hemings in his Sept. 1, 1802 article and that Thomas Gibbons wrote a letter which corroborated Callender's account. The Gibbons letter rises to the level of distinct and independent evidence, because it gives some information that Callender did not provide. Pulitzer-prize winners Dumas Malone and Joseph Ellis also wrote errant histories in this space. Fawn Brodie was the legitimate scholar, Brodie recovered quantities of evidence. Malone and Gordon-Reed castigated Brodie, without providing rationale. Malone, Ellis, and Gordon-Reed failed to connect with the concept of corroboration. Thomas Woodson was born in 1790 and this time also matches the year of birth for the son named Tom attributed to Sally Hemings by James Callender. [6]

Sarah Jane Woodson was born in Chillicothe, Ross County, Ohio, but was raised on her parents' farm in Jackson County, Ohio. Thomas Woodson expanded the farm to 382 acres (155 ha). Abolitionist newspapers in Cincinnati and Pittsburgh reported on the size and prosperity of the farm. He owned 400 heads of cattle, 150 hogs, and "fine horses."[9]

Woodson reportedly showed an interest in education at an early age, memorizing every hymn sung by her family at age three and lengthy passages of the Bible at the age of five.[10] In 1839, Sarah Woodson joined the African Methodist Episcopal Church (AME), founded in 1816 as the first independent black denomination in the United States. Her brothers, Lewis, Thomas, and John were ministers in the church.[3] The Woodson family emphasized education for all their children. Sarah Jane and her older sister Hannah both enrolled in Oberlin College in 1852. A year after it was founded Oberlin gained financial support from wealthy abolitionists. The school made an effort to attract black American students. A few years later Oberlin admitted women, becoming the first co-educational college in the nation. The Oberlin community was a nucleus for the Second Great Awakening. Sarah Jane completed the collegiate program, with a degree in Classical Studies,[11] while Hannah enrolled in the preparatory program and left after about a year.[12] Sarah graduated in 1856, among the first African American women college graduates. Oberlin was one of the schools recommended by the African Methodist Episcopal (AME) church.[citation needed]

Career

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In 1849/50 abolitionist took control of the politics and government in Ohio. In 1856 Salmon Chase was elected governor. Schools for black Ohioan children were established in Southern Ohio. In the decade before the Civil War no other state in the nation supported the education of black students as robustly as Ohio. Before and after graduation from Oberlin, Woodson taught in black 'common schools' in towns such as Circleville and Zanesville for a few years. [13]

When she hired in 1858 by Wilberforce University, Woodson became the first African-American woman college instructor.[3] She was also the first black American to teach at a Historically Black College or University (HBCU) and the only black American woman to teach at a college or university before the Civil War. [14] Wilberforce University is located in Greene County Ohio, not far from Xenia. Her brother, Rev. Lewis Woodson, was a trustee and founder of the college.[3] It had been established in 1856 to educate black youth, as a collaboration between the white and black leaders of the Cincinnati Methodist conference and the AME Church in Ohio, respectively. Wilberforce closed for two years during the Civil War because of the chaos created and because of finances. It lost most of its nearly 200 subscription students at the beginning of the war, as they were mostly mixed-race children of wealthy planters from the South, who withdrew them at that time.[15] During the war, the Cincinnati Methodist Conference could not offer its previous level of financial support, as it was called to care for soldiers and families.

Woodson left Wilberforce. She became the first principal at a public school in Xenia, Ohio.[3] She taught in other towns as well. In 1863 she gave "Address to Youth," to the Ohio Colored Teachers Association, one of a number of speeches she gave following the Emancipation Proclamation to urge African-American youth to join the "political and social revolutions."[3] She encouraged them to follow careers in education and the sciences to lead their race.[3]

The AME Church purchased the college and reopened it in 1863; this was the first African American owned and operated college.[16] Upon Woodson's return to Wilberforce she was appointed "Preceptress of English and Latin and Lady Principal and Matron,"[2] making her a renowned teacher of English and Latin0.[17]

Woodson left Ohio to teach in a new school for black girls established by the Freedmen's Bureau in Hillsboro, North Carolina.[18] Woodson was determined to educate the children of the freedmen. She was not alone, as many Oberlin alumni of both races, due to the school's commitment to anti-slavery ideology and activism, acted on similar commitments.[19]It took commitment but also courage and zeal to move from Ohio to the South at this time, as the South was violent. Former Confederate soldiers carried out violent insurrections to stop the freedmen from voting.

In 1893, Woodson spoke at the World's Congress of Representative Women in Chicago. Her speech was entitled "The Organized Efforts of the Colored Women of the South to Improve Their Condition." Woodson was one of five African American women invited to speak at this event, along with: Fannie Barrier Williams, Anna Julia Cooper, Hallie Quinn Brown, and Fanny Jackson Coppin.[20]

She died at the age of 82 on August 15, 1907.

Marriage and family

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On September 24, 1868, Woodson, then aged 42, married the Reverend Jordan Winston Early, an AME minister who had risen from slavery. Sarah and Jordan Early had no children.[3] Jordan Early retired from active minister appointments in 1888.[21] Sarah Early helped her husband with his ministries, and also taught community schools. In total, she taught school for nearly four decades, as she believed education was critical for the advancement of the race.[3] She served as principal of large schools in four cities as well.[18]

Reform activities

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In 1888, Woodson Early was elected for a four-year term as national superintendent of the Colored Division of the Women’s Christian Temperance Union (WCTU).[22] Frances Ellen Watkins Harper preceded Early as superintendent. When Early took on the position, the WTCU began to pay the travel expenses of the superintendent. She traveled frequently and gave more than 100 speeches to groups throughout a five-state region.[3]She was also a spokesperson for the Prohibition Party in Tennessee.[23]The Colored Division of the WCTU was the first organization to organize black American women on a national platform. [24]

Works

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Legacy and honors

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  • 1888, Woodson Early was appointed superintendent of the Colored Division of the Women's Christian Temperance Union (WCTU).[25]
  • 1893, Woodson Early was named "Representative Woman of the Year" at the Chicago World's Fair (World's Columbian Exposition).

References

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  1. ^ She was not, however, the first black person to teach at the college level. Three black American men taught at Central New York College prior to the Civil War, including George B. Vashon, a graduate of Oberlin College. The school was established by Gerit Smith and went out of operation just before the Civil War began. Wilberforce University, where Woodson taught continues in operation (as of 2018). Benjamin Quarles, Black Abolitionists, New York/London: Oxford University Press, 1969.
  2. ^ a b Lawson, Ellen NicKenzie (1984). The Three Sarahs: Documents of Antebellum Black College Women. New York: Edwin Mellen Press. p. 157. ISBN 0-88946-536-3.Lawson did report that S. J. Woodson's father bought his family's freedom. Lawson did have a source for the information. The source was mistaken. No evidence of such a purchase exists. S. J. Woodson's father gained his freedom when he left Monticello as a teenager. S. J. Woodson's mother, Jemima, gained her freedom by arriving in Greenbrier County, joining her mother. The freedom of neither parent was purchased, nor were they formally manumitted, though Jemima's mother, a mulatto named Hannah, was formally manumitted in Greenbrier County. Thomas Woodson was an octoroon and a white man by Virginia law. White people did not enslave people, who looked as white as them, so his skin color guaranteed his freedom. Thomas Woodson married Jemima, who was brown in color. They lived together as 'free coloreds.'
  3. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l Foner, Philip Sheldon; Branham, Robert James, eds. (1998). Lift every voice: African American oratory, 1787–1900. Studies in rhetoric and communication. Tuscaloosa: University of Alabama Press. pp. 384–385. ISBN 978-0-8173-0906-0. Retrieved May 29, 2013.
  4. ^ "Sarah Jane Woodson Early". History of American Women. March 29, 2015. Retrieved April 18, 2019.
  5. ^ Woodson, Byron W., A President in the Family, Praeger, 2001, p. 86. Over two hundred years after newspaper reports appeared in Virginia newspapers indicating the existence of Sally Hemings' son named Tom, allegedly the son of Thomas Jefferson, professional historians such as Annette Gordon-Reed have ignored the existence of some of the newspaper reports and critically important content of the ones that they have acknowledged. Gordon-Reed and others are "hiding the balls", a practice that Gordon-Reed criticized other historians for doing in her book Thomas Jefferson and Sally Hemings.
  6. ^ a b "Thomas Jefferson and Sally Hemings: A Brief Account", Plantation & Slavery, Monticello, Quote: "The DNA study found no link between the descendants of Field Jefferson [tested because Thomas Jefferson had no direct male descendants] and Thomas C. Woodson... But there is no indication in Jefferson's records of a child born to Hemings before 1795, and there are no known documents to support that Thomas Woodson was Hemings' first child.", accessed 6 March 2011. Woodson, A President in the Family, 215–17.
  7. ^ Foster, Eugene A.; Jobling, M. A.; Taylor, P. G.; Donnelly, P.; de Knijff, P.; Mieremet, Rene; Zerjal, T.; Tyler-Smith, C. (November 1998). "Jefferson fathered slave's last child". Nature. 396 (6706): 27–28. Bibcode:1998Natur.396...27F. doi:10.1038/23835. PMID 9817200. S2CID 4424562.
  8. ^ Byron Woodson, A President in the Family, (Westport CT, Praeger, 2001), 221-235. Byron Woodson was one of the DNA donors. He is a first-hand witness. Dr Foster, the testing organizer, promised the DNA donors that historians would be kept away from the DNA process. Historians had never handled the history honestly. The testing and laboratory work may have been perfect, but the reporting was hijacked by historian Joseph Ellis and others. Dr. Foster was distraught when he learned that he had lost control. After Woodson learned that things had gone astray, Foster answered Woodson's pointed questions honestly and never failed to answer the telephone. Foster did not know Ellis. When Ellis and news outlets, like U. S. News and World Report were preparing a media dump, Foster thought the DNA results were still secret. Ellis appeared as the star of a massive multi-media media dump, reporting the reputed DNA results Nov. 1st and 2nd 1998. Ellis appeared on PBS News Hour Nov. 2, 1998, announcing "...the scientific evidence that we have now generated." Again, DNA donors had been promised that historians would be kept away from the process, knowing of their untrustworthy track record. Foster sent a letter objecting the handling of the matter to Nature (magazine) and the Washington Post reported (1/6/99) that Foster had issued a written objection. Foster told Woodson, "I don't know," when his project was breached, thus Foster did not know if the Nature article reported the actual results or not. ---- Switching to another approach, the movie Sally Hemings was broadcast in the year 2000. Twenty million people simultaneously watched the movie on CBS. The producer acquired "the rights" to Brodie's book so as to "own the underlying material." (Andrews, Sally Hemings, 55) CBS executives, the production company executives and the screenwriter are intelligent, accomplished people and they decided to take on Brodie's evidence rather than the hijacked DNA report. Why did they make that choice? Avoiding a 4,000-word answer -- because they are grown-ups. They decided to not join the historians, like Annette Gordon-Reed in throwing the historic record under the bus. The story changes too much, when Tom and Callender are ripped out of the story. They wanted the movie to make sense. Lastly, there was a track record of ill will between CBS and historians, as in prior decades historians had prevented the movie's production.
  9. ^ Minnie S. Woodson, Woodson Source Book, (Washington D.C. self-published, 1978), p. 32. (LOC 1984).
  10. ^ Monroe Alphus Majors, 1864–1960; in Noted Negro Women: Their Triumphs and Activities(Jackson, TN: M.V. Lynk Publishing House, 1893), 102-103
  11. ^ Brown, Hallie Q (1925). Our women, past, present and future. Eckerle. OCLC 40566703.[page needed]
  12. ^ Lawson, Ellen NicKenzie (1984). The Three Sarahs: Documentation of Antebellum Black College Women. New York: Edwin Mellen Press. p. 156. ISBN 0-88946-536-3.
  13. ^ Majors, Monroe A (1893). Noted negro women: their triumphs and activities. Donohue & Henneberry. OCLC 1244556648.[page needed]
  14. ^ If Horace Mann's niece is considered to be the first American woman to teach at an accredited college, then Woodson was the first woman to do so, who had graduated from a four-year college herself. Rebecca Pennell graduated from a normal school, i.e. a two-year school of higher education. This is a messy consideration as it is difficult to determine the status and quality of early women's colleges, which were seldom called colleges, but labeled women's seminary schools and so on. Both Antioch, where Pennell taught, and Wilberforce were co-ed schools, which boosted their perceived status or 'accreditation.'
  15. ^ James T. Campbell, Songs of Zion, New York: Oxford University Press, 1995, pp. 259-260, accessed 13 Jan 2009
  16. ^ Horace Talbert, "The Sons of Allen: Together with a Sketch of the Rise and Progress of Wilberforce University, Wilberforce, Ohio", 1906, in Documenting the South, 2000, University of North Carolina, accessed 25 Jul 2008
  17. ^ Brown, Hallie Q (1937). Pen pictures of pioneers of Wilberforce. Aldine. OCLC 613201440.[page needed]
  18. ^ a b Jessie+Carney+Smith%22&source=gbs_navlinks Jessie Carney Smith, "Sarah Jane Woodson Early", Notable Black American Women, VNR AG, 1996, pp. 198–200, accessed 6 March 2011
  19. ^ Nat Brandt, The Town That Started the Civil War: The True Story of the Community That Stood Up to Slavery and Changed a Nation Forever, (Crystal Lke, IL, Delta, 1991).
  20. ^ Hairston, Eric Ashley (2013). The Ebony Column. Knoxville: University of Tennessee Press. p. 121. ISBN 978-1-57233-984-2.
  21. ^ Sarah J. W. Early, Life and Labors of Rev. Jordan W. Early, One of the Pioneers of African Methodism in the West and South, Nashville: Publishing House A.M.E. Church Sunday School Union, 1894, carried at Documenting the American South, University of North Carolina, accessed 6 March 2011
  22. ^ "Sarah Jane Early Woodson: First African-American Woman to Become a University Professor". Black Then. Retrieved April 18, 2019.
  23. ^ Boyd, Herb (October 17, 2019). "Sarah Jane Woodson Early, Notable Teacher and Member of the WCTU". New York Amsterdam News. Retrieved June 21, 2021.
  24. ^ Neal Anthony W. (18 February 2016) "Josephine St. Pierre Ruffin, A Pioneer in the Black Women's Club Movement" The Bay State Banner, retrieved 6 June 2024. An 1895 meeting brought together black American women's clubs on a nation platform and is known as the first of its kind.
  25. ^ "Sarah Jane Early fought for education for Black women". African American Registry. Retrieved April 18, 2019.

Further reading

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  • Lawson, Ellen N. (Summer 1981). "Sarah Woodson Early: Nineteenth Century Black Nationalist 'Sister'". Umoja: A Scholarly Journal of Black Studies. 5: 15–26.
  • Ellen Lawson and Marlene Merrill, The Three Sarahs: Documents of Antebellum Black College Women, Edwin Mellen Press, 1984
  • Byron W. Woodson Sr., A President in the Family, Thomas Jefferson Sally Hemings and Thomas Woodson, (Westport CT, Praeger, 2001)
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C-SPAN Book TV Video - https://www.c-span.org/video/?165070-1/a-president-family

Links for the Sally Hemings movie, on YouTube, which is in two parts. The movie originally aired on CBS in the year 2000. Twenty million Americans simultaneously watched the movie when it first aired. The movie explains the Woodson family origin. Movies are thought to be fictional. Yet, the Woodson family stance, as per highly acclaimed author Byron Woodson, is that this movie is less fictional than books written by Annette Gordon Reed, a Pulitzer Prize winning author. The screenplay relies on the research performed by Fawn Brodie.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E2CkUMBKYqI Part 2 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bE1beAraNJY&t=531s

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