Posted 1:01 am Sunday, November 14, 2010
ETexas Native Remembered For Her Firsts
Jefferson Was First Black Female Harvard Graduate
By SONYA ROBERTS-WOODS
Special to the Tyler Courier-Times--Telegraph
Special to the Tyler Courier-Times--Telegraph
Nestled in the deep piney woods of East Texas just north of Carthage is the small, predominantly African-American community of Walnut Grove. It's the place where the maternal family of Dr. Mildred Fay Jefferson recently held a memorial service to bid a final farewell to their daughter of distinction.
Dr. Jefferson, who often was considered the architect of the pro-life movement, died Oct. 15 at her home in Cambridge, Mass., at the age of 83.
A woman of many firsts, Dr. Jefferson became the first black woman to graduate from Harvard Medical School in 1951. While Panola County is where her earlier, formative years were spent, Dr. Jefferson actually was born in Pittsburg on April 6, 1927.
At the time, her father Millard F. Jefferson and mother Gurthline "Gur thie" Roberts Jefferson lived in Pitts burg where he served as pastor of a local Methodist congregation. Her mother taught at an all-black rural community just outside of Camp County known as Center Point.
An only child, Dr. Jefferson and her family moved back to her mother's birthplace of Walnut Grove when she still was a toddler. It is where Jefferson spent her childhood and teen years. At age 14, she graduated at the top of her class from what then was known as Carthage Colored High School.
Soon after, she entered Texas Col lege in Tyler and graduated summa cum laude at 17. Later she earned a master's degree from Tufts University in Medford, Mass., before entering Harvard.
Dr. Johnnie Jones, current chief academic officer at Texas College, spoke at the family memorial service held at the Walnut Grove Baptist Church where Dr. Jefferson worshipped each Sunday growing up. In 1980, Jones explained that Dr. Jefferson received Texas College's Outstanding Alumni of the Decade Award and served as the 1981 commencement speaker at the four-year private college chartered in 1894.
"She was a dreamer of no small dreams," Jones said. "Of all of the HBCUs (historically black colleges and universities) that exist, to come from Texas College makes us extremely proud. Texas College mourns the loss but honors the legacy of an alumnus who leaves such a wonderful legacy of firsts."
Indeed, Dr. Jefferson's life is a collection of firsts. She became the first female surgical intern at Boston City Hospital and the first woman admitted into the Boston Surgical Society. Hailed as a powerful and poised orator, Dr. Jefferson made three attempts at a seat in the U.S. Senate. Although unsuccessful in her bids, her true calling always remained as physician crusading for the unborn.
Dr. Jefferson, who was divorced, never herself had any children. As co-founder of the National Right to Life Committee, she testified before Con gress in 1981 after the Supreme Court decision, Roe v. Wade, which legalized abortion.
Earl Sholley, a longtime colleague of Dr. Jefferson, made the 1,800-mile journey by car from his home in Massachusetts with friends Liz Clayton and Loel Kessler. The three traveled all night to attend the service. Sholley worked alongside Dr. Jefferson for many years.
"She was a remarkable person," Sholley said. "She had an unbelievable ability to remember facts. Her sense of recall and clarity was simply uncanny. She was an ambassador for life and she had such an incredible impact on people. She truly took the Hippocratic Oath seriously. She was a true healer - a real people's doctor. She was concerned for the rights of all people, not just the privileged. I know the doors of heaven have been opened and God has now said 'well done, thy good and faithful servant.'"
The Walnut Grove community was established just after the Civil War ended in the early 1870s by former slave William "Bill" Roberts, Dr. Jefferson's great-grandfather. The close-knit community supplied Dr. Jefferson with lessons that would last her a lifetime.
Dr. Jefferson's first cousin, Fannie Lou Thompson, recalled the two were inseparable as playmates growing up in Walnut Grove.
"Many people don't know it, but Mildred performed her first operation at the age of 3 ... on me," Ms. Thompson said with a chuckle. "At an early age, you knew she was going to be something great. Her motto to me was always "if I can help someone along the way, then my living then will not be in vain. Certainly, my cousin's living was not in vain."
Brenda Horn flew from her home in Stafford, Va., to pay her final respects to her dear friend and close colleague. Ms. Horn, who works as services coordinator for the national headquarters of the American Life League, regularly assisted Dr. Jefferson with travel arrangements as she crisscrossed the country delivering a message of life.
"If it had to be by plane, train or automobile, I was going to be here today," Ms. Horn said. "I wouldn't have been anywhere else today but here. I just had to say my final goodbyes to my friend. She was indeed a remarkable person."
Nina Johnson, a noted Camp County historian, invited Dr. Jeffer son to return to her birthplace in 1993 and speak at an annual Black History Month Program.
"Dr. Jefferson was a wonderful person and a wonderful speaker," Ms. Johnson said. "We all enjoyed having her when she came to Pittsburg that year. It was her first time back since her family left."
Atholene Brewster, a longtime Panola County educator, also spoke at the family memorial service.
"Walnut Grove, you are to be commended," Ms. Brewster said. "You have produced some really important people in this community. In spite of what we as a race didn't have, we made the best of what we did have. The books we used were used. I never used a book that didn't already have a name in it. Dr. Jefferson proved that in spite of or nevertheless it was still possible to become successful. She let nothing stop her."
Roberts, a retired USDA soil conservationist and pastor of the Mount Olive Baptist Church in Mount Pleasant, delivered the final memorial tribute at the service. His father, Baker Roberts, and Dr. Jefferson's mother were siblings making the two first cousins. Roberts summed up the life of his relative with three scriptures.
"Proverbs 18:16 reads: A man's gift maketh room for him and brings him before great men," Roberts said of the gender-neutral scripture. "Proverbs 31:10 asks who can find a virtuous woman, and John 10:10 says I am come that they might have life and that they might have it more abundantly. Mildred championed the right of all to life. All of these scriptures characterized her wonderful life. I think we have done her justice here today. She now takes her place alongside her mother, her grandmother, her grandfather, uncles, aunts and cousins as her final resting place in the community she always called home."
Several public memorial services have been conducted across the nation, including a special ceremony set for 2 to 4 p.m. Nov. 26 at the Harvard Memorial Church, Harvard University in Cambridge, Mass.
Sonya Roberts-Woods is the managing editor of The Clarksville Times.
