Emma V. Kelley

Emma V. Kelley (February 8, 1867 – December 14, 1932) was an American educator and community organizer. She founded a women's organization, the Grand Temple of Daughter Elks.

Emma V. Kelley, from a 1921 publication.

Early life

Kelley was born as Emma Virginia Lee in Barrett's Neck, Nansemond County, Virginia, the daughter of John Lee and Agnes Walker Lee. She trained as a teacher at Hampton Normal Institute.[1][2]

Career

Emma Kelley taught as a young woman, before she married. In widowhood, she moved to Norfolk, Virginia, where she founded the "Daughters of the Improved Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks of the World", the first women's auxiliary to the Improved Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks of the World (IBPOEW), a black fraternal organization, in 1903.[3] The organization was affiliated with the National Council of Negro Women. She wrote a short history of the organization, published posthumously in 1943.[4]

Personal life

Emma V. Lee married Robert Kelley in 1893. They had a daughter, Buena Vista Kelley.[5] Emma V. Kelley was widowed in 1900. She died in 1932, aged 65 years.[1] Her grave in Calvary Cemetery in Norfolk is included on historical tours of the cemetery.[6] The Daughters of Elks national organization presents an annual Emma V. Kelley Achievement Award, named in her memory.[7]

References
  1. Emma V. Kelley, Calvary Cemetery, Historic Forrest website.
  2. A. B. Caldwell, History of the American Negro and his Institutions, Virginia Edition (A. B. Caldwell Publishing 1921): 499-501.
  3. Theda Skocpol, Ariane Liazos, Marshall Ganz, eds., What a Mighty Power We Can Be: African American Fraternal Groups and the Struggle for Racial Equality (Princeton University Press 2006): 71-72. ISBN 9780691122991
  4. Kelley's history of the Daughters of I.B.P.O.E.W. : organized June 13, 1902, Norfolk, Va. (1943).
  5. National Council of Negro Women, The Historical Cookbook of the American Negro (Beacon Press 2000): 58. ISBN 9780807009642
  6. "A Tour of Historic Calvary Cemetery" (February 14, 2015), Norfolk Department of Recreation, Parks, and Open Space.
  7. "Female Evangelists" The Crisis (November 1982): 38.
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