The story of two Brooklyn sisters who forged a family of firsts
New York – A tranquil playground in Williamsburg is named after Sarah JS Tompkins Garnet. Two miles away in Dumbo is a park named after Susan Smith McKinney Steward. These aren’t the only places with their names. one Schools in Fort Greenand Another high of prospect Also named after them.
What marks did these women leave in Brooklyn?
Dr. Susan Smith McKinney Steward was the first black woman to practice medicine in New York State, a graduate of Wadictorian and opened a thriving office in Brooklyn.
“She is working as a teacher and that’s her own income is being paid through medical school,” Dominique Jean-Louis said. Brooklyn Public Library Brooklyn Historical Center.
Her sister, Sarah Garnet, became the first black female principal at a New York City public school.
Jean-Louis told CBS News New York correspondent Hannah Kliger: “It’s easy to understand how they became pioneers. It’s also a nation or even international country that black women have. symbol. ” “It’s related to the special circumstances of the Black community in Brooklyn, especially Weeksville, which is creating such excellence.”
Jean-Louis said looking at the tips that their early lives can draw inspiration for them.
They were born in Sylvanus Smith, a thriving pig farmer Weeksville in BrooklynThis is one of the earliest American black communities established in the 1830s.
To the top, it is a thriving self-sufficiency black community full of businesses, churches and schools.
“The world they grew up in is a black bulge where people are not only trying to do their own efforts for themselves, to achieve goals in a world with specific black obstacles, but they are also trying to elevate their neighbors.” Jean Louis explained.
Regina Robbins is Weeksville Heritage CenterLeave a few original houses here as well as a collection of celebrating outstanding residents.
“People are attracted not only by economic necessity, but also aspire to be part of most black communities, when America was essentially unheard of,” she said.
Mrs. Garnet and Dr. McKinney Steward went to London in 1911 to attend the Global Conference to promote interracial harmony.
Dr. McKinney Steward specializes in childhood illnesses and co-founded a hospital and later in life, she ventured with her second husband, Theophilus Gould Steward, the first all-black in the United States. United States Army Buffalo soldiers of the Legion.
Her great-granddaughter is the late actress Ellen Hollythe first black soap star in the United States died in 2023.
“It’s special when someone realizes what you do,” Holly said in a 2004 interview.
The two sisters also participated in the women’s suffrage movement and helped to establish an equal suffrage coalition, which worked to abolish racial and gender discrimination in the late 1880s.
“Once the abolition was cancelled, a lot of allies disappeared. You let the woman stand there and ask, ‘Well, where are we? , Robbins explained.
exist Brooklyn’s Historic Green Wood Cemetery It is the distance between two graves. Two sisters resting place, they hope to educate and heal their communities.
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