My Mother Never Let Go of Her Faith, Her Quilts, Or Her Style

Cincinnati proved to be a place where my mother could thrive. While she respected the ideals of being a good wife and mother, she had bigger dreams and aspirations. Mom wanted it all — and she would have it. My parents built an ultra-modern home in a very conventional, suburban Black neighborhood in Cincinnati. It was an asymmetrical house made of red wood complete with an indoor swimming pool. My parents would host chic cocktail parties and luncheons inviting people in and, of course, dressed to the nines. 

For this day and age, my Mom was definitely not a traditional Mother. She was a Hearing Officer in the Welfare Department for the State of Ohio, organist at our church, Den Mother for my Cub Scout Troop, and active in her Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority, and other women’s focused groups like the Links, Inc.. She was always wearing something fabulous — a black chiffon Christian Dior dress, a purple cape with matching pants and suede boots, a Vogue-pattern black jumpsuit with a matching turban. For me it was normal, to my friends and schoolmates, not so much. 

My Mother was part of a community of Black affluent women in the United States whose stories are mostly unwritten. Hidden figures in American history who were the backbone of the Civil Rights Movement, educators, organizers and philanthropists who sustained and served Black life, families, and culture all while dressing with great style and presenting themselves with dignity in a world filled with misogyny, white supremacy, and racism. These women like Fannie Lou Hammer, Dorothy Height, Constance Baker Motley, Marian Wright Edelman, Eunice Johnson, and Shirley Chisholm to name a few, are the unsung superheroes of our country whose capes (literally and figuratively) were fabulous fashion statements. 

Like many Black women of her era and still today, my Mom didn’t want to just look fabulous, she wanted to be fabulous. She fully realized the concept of style and substance and knew that she commanded a certain amount of respect, acceptance and power because of the way she dressed. In many ways my Mother was light years ahead of her time — centering herself while simultaneously practicing work/life balance. I remember her referring to herself often as “a liberated woman.” While many Black women struggle with the feminist movement and their visibility in it, Mom was exercising that ideology. She attended law school part time while working a full time job and pregnant with my older brother Erik. A married, pregnant Black woman in law school in the early ’60s was definitely an anomaly — a force to be reckoned with.