Fannie Barrier Williams was an African American

African American

African Americans are citizens or residents of the United States who have at least partial ancestry from any of the native populations of Sub-Saharan Africa and are the direct descendants of enslaved Africans within the boundaries of the present United States...

 educator and political and women's rights

Women's rights

Women's rights are entitlements and freedoms claimed for women and girls of all ages in many societies.In some places these rights are institutionalized or supported by law, local custom, and behaviour, whereas in others they may be ignored or suppressed...

 activist. She became well known for her efforts to have blacks officially represented on the Board of Control of the World's Columbian Exposition

World's Columbian Exposition

The World's Columbian Exposition was a World's Fair held in Chicago in 1893 to celebrate the 400th anniversary of Christopher Columbus's arrival in the New World in 1492. Chicago bested New York City; Washington, D.C.; and St...

 in 1893.

Biography

Frances (Fannie) Barrier was the youngest of three children born to Anthony and Harriet Barrier. Her father, born in Pennsylvania

Pennsylvania

The Commonwealth of Pennsylvania is a U.S. state that is located in the Northeastern and Mid-Atlantic regions of the United States. The state borders Delaware and Maryland to the south, West Virginia to the southwest, Ohio to the west, New York and Ontario, Canada, to the north, and New Jersey to...

, came to Brockport, New York

Brockport, New York

Brockport is a village located in the Town of Sweden in Monroe County, New York, USA. The population was 8,103 at the 2000 census. The name is derived from Hiel Brockway, an early settler....

 as a child. He claimed to be partially of French descent. He worked as a barber and later became a coal dealer. Her mother Harriet was born in Chenango, New York

Chenango, New York

Chenango is a town in Broome County, New York, United States. The population was 11,454 at the 2000 census.The Town of Chenango is in the eastern part of the county, northeast of Binghamton.- History :The town was first settled around 1787....

 and the couple married in Brockport. The family attended the First Baptist Church in Brockport, and was the only black family in the congregation. Fannie recalled her Brockport youth as a time of innocence, but her personal experience and growing awareness of the unfair treatment received by women of color led her to pursue a lifetime of activism.

All three Barrier children attended Brockport public schools. After graduation, Fannie Barrier went on to the Brockport Normal School, a teachers college (now SUNY Brockport), and was the first black to graduate in 1870. After graduation, Fannie Barrier went to the Washington D.C. area to teach joining the emerging education movement which focused on freedmen and freedwomen. She reported that she was "shattered" by the discrimination she encountered in the more southern city. She also experienced significant difficulties due to her race when she enrolled in the School of Fine Arts in Washington to study portrait painting, and had a similar experience when she attempted to study at the New England Conservatory of Music in Boston, Massachusetts.

While teaching in Washington, D.C., she met her future husband S. Laing Williams of Georgia

Georgia (U.S. state)

Georgia is a state located in the southeastern United States. It was established in 1732, the last of the original Thirteen Colonies. The state is named after King George II of Great Britain. Georgia was the fourth state to ratify the United States Constitution, on January 2, 1788...

. He worked in the United States Pension Office while studying law at Columbian University (later George Washington University

George Washington University

The George Washington University is a private, coeducational comprehensive university located in Washington, D.C. in the United States...

 Law School). They were married in Brockport in August 1887, returned to Washington, and eventually settled in Chicago, Illinois where Williams was admitted to the Illinois bar and began a successful law practice. The couple joined All Souls (Unitarian

Unitarianism

Unitarianism is a Christian theological movement, named for its understanding of God as one person, in direct contrast to Trinitarianism which defines God as three persons coexisting consubstantially as one in being....

) Church in Chicago.

After the death of her husband in 1921, Barrier Williams remained in Chicago until 1926, when she returned to Brockport to live with her sister. She continued to advocate for African-American women until her death in 1944.

Social activism

In Chicago, leaving behind her teaching career, Barrier Williams became active among local community activists and reformers. She was director of the art and music department of the Prudence Crandall Study Club, an organization formed by Chicago’s elite African-American community. With her husband, she worked for the Hyde Park Colored Voters Republican Club and the Taft Colored League.

Associating with both Frederick Douglass

Frederick Douglass

Frederick Douglass was an American social reformer, orator, writer and statesman. After escaping from slavery, he became a leader of the abolitionist movement, gaining note for his dazzling oratory and incisive antislavery writing...

 and Booker T. Washington

Booker T. Washington

Booker Taliaferro Washington was an American educator, author, orator, and political leader. He was the dominant figure in the African-American community in the United States from 1890 to 1915...

, she represented the viewpoint of African-Americans in the Illinois Women’s Alliance and lectured frequently on the need for all women, but especially black women, to have the vote. Her women’s rights was recognized when she was the only African-American selected to eulogize Susan B. Anthony

Susan B. Anthony

Susan Brownell Anthony was a prominent American civil rights leader who played a pivotal role in the 19th century women's rights movement to introduce women's suffrage into the United States. She was co-founder of the first Women's Temperance Movement with Elizabeth Cady Stanton as President...

 at the 1907 National American Woman Suffrage Association

National American Woman Suffrage Association

The National American Woman Suffrage Association was an American women's rights organization formed in May 1890 as a unification of the National Woman Suffrage Association and the American Woman Suffrage Association...

 convention.

Barrier Williams was among the founders of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People

National Association for the Advancement of Colored People

The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, usually abbreviated as NAACP, is an African-American civil rights organization in the United States, formed in 1909. Its mission is "to ensure the political, educational, social, and economic equality of rights of all persons and to...

 (NAACP). She also helped found the National League of Colored Women in 1893 and its successor, the National Association of Colored Women (NACW) in 1896. She was involved in the establishment and development of other reform and service oriented organizations, including:

• Provident Hospital, in 1891, an inter-racial medical facility that included a nursing training school that admitted black women.
• Frederick Douglass Center, in 1905, a settlement house.
• the Phillis Wheatley Home for Girls.
• the National Federation of Afro-American Women, 1895, working with Mary Church Terrell
  Mary Church Terrell
  Mary Church Terrell , daughter of former slaves, was one of the first African-American women to earn a college degree. She became an activist who led several important associations and worked for civil rights and suffrage....
  
  .

When Barrier Williams was nominated to the prestigious Chicago Women’s Club in 1894, she and her supporters received threats, both public and private. Barrier Williams continued to fight for inclusion and was admitted in 1895. She was also the first black and the first woman on the Chicago Library Board.

Columbian Exposition of 1893

Barrier Williams achieved broader public recognition due to her efforts to gain representation of blacks at the Chicago Columbian Exposition of 1893. She succeeded in having two staff appointments designated for African-Americans and ensured that African-American interests were included in the program. She was appointed as Clerk in charge of Colored Interests in the Department of Publicity and Promotions.

Barrier Williams was invited to present two major addresses at the Exposition. In the first, "The Intellectual Progress of the Colored Women of the United States Since the Emancipation Proclamation", Barrier Williams addressed the World’s Congress of Representative Women and disputed the notion that slavery had rendered African-American women incapable of the same moral and intellectual levels as other women. She called on all women to unite to claim their inalienable rights. Her address was followed by a discussion by Anna Julia Cooper and Fannie Jackson Coppin as well as words of praise for all three women's speeches from Frederick Douglass.

The second speech was presented to the World’s Parliament of Religions. Entitled "What Can Religion Further Do to Advance the condition of the American Negro?" , the address called upon churches, particularly those in the South, to open their doors to all people, regardless of race. Barrier Williams proclaimed a continuing belief in the ability of religion and faith to correct society’s problems.

External links

• Fannie Barrier Williams Biography