author
Mary White Ovington
1865–1951
A white ally in the early civil rights movement, she helped found the NAACP and spent decades pushing for racial justice, women's suffrage, and social reform. Her writing and organizing helped bring interracial activism into public view at a pivotal moment in American history.
4 Audiobooks
The Shadow
by Mary White Ovington
How the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People Began
by Mary White Ovington
Hazel
by Mary White Ovington
Half a Man: The Status of the Negro in New York
by Mary White Ovington
About the author
Born in Brooklyn in 1865, she grew up in a family shaped by abolitionist and women's rights ideals. She later became active in settlement work, journalism, and socialist circles, using both research and public advocacy to challenge racial discrimination and unequal working conditions.
She is best known as one of the founders of the NAACP in 1909. Working alongside figures including W. E. B. Du Bois and other reformers, she served the organization for many years and became one of its most steady early leaders.
She was also a writer whose books included Half a Man, Portraits in Color, and the autobiography The Walls Came Tumbling Down. Remembered as a suffragist, journalist, and civil rights activist, she remained committed to interracial justice work until her death in 1951.