(See the video of President Obama as he delivers the eulogy of Dr. Dorothy Height)
On April 21, 2010 I read of Dorothy Height in the Los Angeles Times. Height was called “the queen mother of the civil rights movement” and was the president of the National Council of Negro Women for 41 years. Sadly, the first day I heard her name was on the day of her death.
Upon reading the article by Jocelyn Y. Stewart, I learned that Ms. Height was “Often the only woman at strategy meetings with the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. and other leaders, she was a determined voice pressing the importance of issues affecting women and children, such as child care and education.” Dorothy Height’s “initiatives included training thousands of women –housewives, teachers, office workers, students — to work as community advocates.”
I want to highlight Dorothy Height’s life here because I think she leaves behind a powerful message of serving fearlessly and claiming your place in leadership. Her story is a reminder to me to keep my focus on the greater good and to continually do my part in creating positive change in my world even if that effort goes unnoticed or is unpopular to some.
President Obama says it eloquently in his closing words of her eulogy, “Dorothy Height was a drum major for justice, a drum major for equality, a drum major for service. And the lesson she would want us to leave with today…is that we can all be first in service. We can all be drum majors for a righteous cause. Let us honor her life by changing this country for the better as long as we are blessed to live. May God bless Dr. Dorothy Height and the union that she made more perfect.”
