Portrait of 12 year old Nellie Rathbone Bright. Her early years were spent in Savannah, Georgia, where she was born on March 28, 1898, the only child of the Rev. Richard Bright and Nellie (Jones) Bright. She was named for her mother and grandmother as well as for her godmother, Caroline Rathbone, a social activist. Rev. Bright, the first black Episcopal priest in the Savannah Episcopal diocese, was born in St. Thomas, then part of the Dutch West Indies, in 1866. He was educated at St. Augustine Collegiate Institute in Raleigh, North Carolina, and the Episcopal Theological seminary in New York, where he graduated in 1891. Her mother, from Louisville, Kentucky, was educated in Europe as a teacher after she was denied entrance to schools in the United States. Together, the Rev. Bright and his wife Nellie established the first private kindergarten and primary school for blacks in Georgia in 1892. After serving the Savannah diocese for almost twenty years, the Rev. Bright moved his family from Savannah to accept an appointment in Philadelphia. Shortly after arriving in Philadelphia, Nellie Bright earned her eighth grade graduation diploma in 1910 from Stanton Public School. She then obtained a diploma as a grade school teacher, from William Penn High, Normal Teacher Training School, in 1916. Bright continued her education in 1919 when she entered the University of Pennsylvania, where she became a member of the Delta Sigma Theta sorority. She graduated with a Bachelor’s degree in English in 1923. In addition to her studies at the University of Pennsylvania, Bright also pursued research at the Sorbonne and Oxford, as well as art studies at the Berkshire School of Art in Berkshire Hills, Massachusetts. While working as a young teacher in the Philadelphia schools, Bright also participated in the black intellectual renaissance flourishing in many large cities at that time. She co-founded and contributed to the literary magazine Black Opals established in the 1920s to encourage black writers. During this period she also furnished articles to other literary magazines intended to encourage black authors. In addition to literary articles, Bright wrote on black history and black education in early Philadelphia. After more than a decade of teaching in the Philadelphia public schools, Bright accepted an appointment as a principal in 1935, an office she held at various schools in Philadelphia until 1952. From 1952 until 1959, at the direction of the Board of Education, she taught in-service courses on black history for other teachers. The classes were held at The Fellowship House, an advocacy group promoting racial tolerance and civil rights through non-violent means. During her years as teacher and then principal, Bright served on over fifteen civic boards or organizations directed toward improving schools and neighborhoods by encouraging open housing, improvements in city health services, and facilitating cooperation among diverse members of society. Her efforts continued into her later years, when in 1970, at the age of 72, Bright co-authored a children’s book of social history, American: Red, White, Black, Yellow. During her lifetime she received numerous awards for her educational and civic leadership efforts, most notably a certificate from the Pennsylvania Society for the Abolition of Slavery, dated June 10, 1972. Fluent in French and Spanish, Bright traveled extensively in the Caribbean and Europe. A painter, as well as a writer, she depicted travel scenes in oil paintings. Bright remained single all her life, and died February 7, 1977. [Bio and Photo: The Historical Society of Pennsylvania: Nellie Rathbone Bright Family Papers]
Posted on: Mon, 03 Nov 2014 01:03:32 +0000
Trending Topics
Recently Viewed Topics
© 2015