Marilyn Devonish in Conversation with Patricia Evelyn Green-Rodgers

A pioneer in the Human and Civil Rights Movement Patricia worked alongside the history makers of our time.

We discussed the pioneering women of the National Council of Negro Women and how this organization, founded in 1935 by Dr. Mary McLeod Bethune, shaped who I became through its role as an agent of change beneficial to the black woman, her family, and community, both domestic and global. 

Patricia said:

I will focus on four women: Mrs. Bethune; Sue Bailey Thurman, editor of NCNW's Aframerican Women’s Journal; Dr. Dorothy Height, NCNW’s longest national president and the woman who appeared in photos alongside Martin Luther King and other male civil rights giants; and Maida Springer Kemp, my mentor who drove NCNW’s presence in Africa while the highest-ranking African American female trade union leader. 

I will speak to the impact NCNW had on me, as National Director of a juvenile justice program for girls, and as a two-term president of its Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania chapter. NCNW showed me the power of connectivity and sisterhood beyond country borders.  I learned while a twenty-something year old that an interconnected global community could benefit from a female style of leadership ready to address and solve critical issues that impacted women, children, and marginalized communities worldwide. NCNW taught me that.  Since its founding, NCNW has been an integral voice for change, and I am who I am because of the sister sages who showed me the way. 

I also conducted research on NCNW in fulfillment of requirements for the master's degree in Public Relations.