Mary Ann Shadd Cary turns 197, Google doodle on anti-slavery activist, journalist

Happy Birthday Mary Ann Shadd Cary!!!

Google today dedicates a beautiful doodle to Mary Ann Shadd Cary on her 197^th birthday. She was an American-Canadian anti-slavery activist, journalist, publisher, teacher and lawyer.

Mary Ann Shadd Cary was born on October 9, 1823 was the first Black woman publisher in North America and the first woman publisher in Canada. She was the second Black woman to earn a law degree in the US. She is renowned as a courageous pioneer in the fight for abolition and women’s suffrage.

Mary Ann Shadd Cary grown up in a family that frequently served as a refuge for fugitive slaves. When it became illegal to educate African-American children in the state of Delaware, the Shadd family moved to Pennsylvania, where Mary attended a Quaker Boarding School. In 1840, after being away at school, Mary Ann returned to East Chester and established a school for black children. She also later taught in Norristown, Pennsylvania and New York City.

In 1848, Frederick Douglass asked readers in his newspaper, The Northern Star, to offer their suggestions on what could be done to improve life for African-Americans. Just at the age of 25, Mary Ann Shadd Cary wrote to him to say, “We should do more and talk less.” Frederick Douglass published her letter in his paper.

When the Fugitive Slave Law of 1850 in the US threatened to return free northern blacks and escaped slaves into bondage, Mary Ann Shadd Cary and her brother Isaac moved to Canada and settled in Windsor, Ontario, across the border from Detroit. This is where her efforts to create free black settlements in Canada first began.

Mary Ann Shadd Cary founded an anti-slavery paper, called The Provincial Freeman in 1853. The paper's slogan was ‘Devoted to antislavery, temperance and general literature’. It was published weekly, and the first issue was published in Toronto, Ontario, on March 24, 1853. It ran for four years, before financial challenges forced the paper to fold. She traveled widely in Canada and the United States to increase subscription to the paper, and to publicly solicit aid for runaway slaves. Because of the Fugitive Slave Act, these trips included significant risk to Cary's personal well-being; free blacks could be captured by bounty hunters seeking escaped slaves.

Mary Ann Shadd Cary's former residence in the U Street Corridor was declared a National Historic Landmark in 1976. In 1987 she was designated a Women's History Month Honoree by the National Women's History Project. In 1998, Mary Ann Shadd Cary was inducted into the National Women's Hall of Fame. She was also honored by Canada, being designated a Person of National Historic Significance. She is featured in Canada's citizenship test study guide, released in 2009.

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