Point of Curiosity: Who is the author of Cheyney University's early history?
Follow up from
Coppin State, Cheyney University and Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCU)
When I added
A Living Legend: The History of Cheyney University, 1837-1951 by Charline Fay Howard Conyers to my Goodreads to-read list, I noticed that there was no information available about the author. Even her
alma mater (one of many, as I'm discovering) failed to list her birth and death dates. Did that mean she was still alive and being coquettish about her birth date, or did they not know? And if they didn't know, why not?
As a reader of non-fiction on ancient Cretan and Egyptian history from the early 20th century, I have evolved a bit of a crusade to undo some wrongs done to women during that era. Namely, women who researched or even wrote whole sections of these books are often not credited. It is our good fortune that the male authors whose names adorned the covers of these books sometimes took the time to include thanks to their helpers in a foreword which often reveals the byline-worthy contributions these women made. These women weren't just typing a manuscript, they were often Linguists, Archaeologists, Egyptologists and Historians in their own right. One such example is
Edith Williams Ware and
Caroline Ransom Williams' contributions to the transliterations and interpretation of
The Edwin Smith Surgical Papyrus which is credited exclusively to
James Henry Breasted.
At least in this case, Conyers is credited for writing the book. However, a preliminary search to expand her biography only gave me enough information to make me very curious. And that's when four hours passed without my noticing as I dug deeper into her digitized history during the 1930s and 1940s.
My eventual goal is to update her
Goodreads Author Profile to be more complete (ETA: done!) and possibly create a Wikipedia page on her depending on what I am able to learn. Here is my current list of things I've learned about Conyers since wandering down this tangent:
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| Dr. Charline Fay Howard Conyers, 1989 (src, Clarence Harris) |
- Born 9 October 1911 (thanks to my buddy Phil who utilized his genealogy resources to appease my curiosity)
- She was in the class of 1928 for something, but unsure what; HS graduation? (src)
- In 1933, she was the "Interracial Secretary" at the Pennsylvania branch of the Women's International League for Peace and Freedom (WILPF) and had a brief correspondence about the capitalization of "Negro" with W. E. B. du Bois (src)
- She was a pianist, and a 1936 graduate (or hopeful for the 1936 class, pending further research) from the Froehlich School of Music in Harrisburg, PA (src 1, src 2)
- In September of 1938, she was a Maid of Honor at the wedding of Hermione Hill at St. Simon's Church on 22nd and Reed St. in Philadelphia, PA and wore a yellow tulle gown with a brown velvet poke bonnet (src)
- On 15 June 1940, she was married to William Conyers
- In 1942, she was the Chairman of the "Subcommittee on Lectures" at the Cheyney Training School for Teachers which would later evolve into Cheyney University (src)
- Died 23 September 1989 in West Chester, PA at Chester County Hospital and is buried at the William Howard Day Cemetery in Steelton, PA (src)
And then I hit the jackpot:
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| The Evening News 25 June 1935 (Harrisburg, PA) |
