Verda Welcome interview

Description

Verda Mae Freeman Welcome (1907-1990) was a public school teacher, civil rights activist, and one of the first Black women to be elected to a state Senate in the United States. In 1929 Welcome moved to Baltimore, Maryland, from North Carolina, and from 1934 to 1945 she taught in the Baltimore City public school system. She received a bachelor's degree in history from Morgan State College in 1939 and in 1943 she completed a master's degree in history at New York University. In 1962 Welcome was elected to the Maryland State Senate and she worked to pass legislation which discouraged racial discrimination. In this oral history interview, Welcome primarily discusses the direction of the civil rights movement in Maryland under Lillie May Carroll Jackson. Other topics of discussion include picketing for integration at the Gwynn Oak Amusement Park, factions in the Black community, and the relationship between the Black and Jewish populations in Baltimore.