Honoring ‘Strength, Resolve and Legacy’: 50 Years of Black Women at Wake
In 1969, Beth Norbrey Hopkins and Deborah Graves McFarlane moved into the Jabez A. Bostwick women’s residence hall at Wake Forest University. According to Wake Forest News, “[they] simply wanted to obtain a good education and weren’t thinking about making history as the first African American women to come to Wake Forest as resident students. But they did.”
I, too was a Bostwick Babe.
When I moved into my freshman dorm room in the fall of 1990, I had no idea that it had been less than 25 years since the first black woman had lived on campus. To my 18-year old mind, 25 years rightfully felt like a lifetime ago. Today, to my almost 50-year old mind, it seems shockingly short!
It was my pleasure to pay homage on February 1, to this group of women who paved the way for me. It’s their shoulders that I stood on during my time at WFU. Thank you Camille Russell Love ('73), Beth Norbrey Hopkins ('73), Linda Holiday, Deborah Graves McFarlane ('73), and Awilda Gilliam Neal ('73) for clearing a path so that my walk as a Demon Deacon would be easier.
Humbled and grateful,
Traci
