Frances ellen watkins harper iola leroy
Frances ellen watkins harper black past!
As a poet, author, and lecturer, Frances Ellen Watkins Harper was a household name in the nineteenth century. Not only was she the first African American woman to publish a short story, but she was also an influential abolitionist, suffragist, and reformer that co-founded the National Association of Colored Women’s Clubs.
Frances Ellen Watkins Harper was born on September 24, 1825 in Baltimore, Maryland.
An only child, Harper was born to free African American parents. Unfortunately, by the time she was three years old, both of her parents died and she became an orphan.
Frances harper death
Harper’s aunt and uncle, Henrietta and William Watkins, raised her after her parent’s death. Her uncle was an outspoken abolitionist, practiced self-taught medicine, organized a black literary society and established his own school in 1820 called the Watkins Academy for Negro Youth.
Frances Harper learned from her uncle’s activism and she attended the Watkins Academy until she was thirteen years old. At that age, chi
