Annie Mae Kenion (1912–2009)

Abstract

This article examines the career of Annie Mae Kenion who worked as a Jeanes teacher and supervisor of African American schools for more than 40 years. Strict racial segregation and disenfranchisement was the order of the day throughout most of her career, forcing her to negotiate the system gingerly in order to serve children. Kenion’s professional life illustrates an unyielding love of learning and the stark connection between education and the African American struggle against oppression.

African American teachers and administrators who worked in the nation’s rural segregated schools historically “acted as informal social workers and general problem solvers” for their communities and schools (quoted in Fairclough, 2000, p. 81). Gilmore (1996, p. 165) described these teachers as doing “social work on the fly, leaving neither permanent settlement houses nor case files behind” to capture their experiences. Yet there was nothing minimalistic about their work. An examination of the careers of innumerous mid-20th-century African American teachers captures their varied social service experiences that extended well beyond the classroom proper. Annie Mae Kenion’s career was a vivid reflection of these phenomena.

Annie Mae Kenion (1912–2009) began to teach in North Carolina’s public education system immediately after she graduated from college in 1941, during a time when the race looked to teachers as leaders and role models. She embraced public school instruction and learning with a lifelong zeal that never waned. Even when approaching her 92nd birthday, Kenion repeated one of her favorite and most cogent statements, “If I could go back to school today, I would” (A. M. Kenion, personal communication, June 8, 2003). Education has long been a cornerstone of African Americans’ progress, especially in the South, and it has been embraced as a way to escape the violence of discrimination and oppression while simultaneously “upbuilding” the community (Brown, 2008; Carlton-LaNey, 1999, 2001). Kenion’s career spanned more than 40 years, weaving throughout a time of strict racial segregation and disenfranchisement to the 1954 Brown v. Board of Education decision to the civil rights movement of the 1960s to a time of relative racial calm, albeit continued social injustices.

African Americans have historically been denied access to education and, as a consequence, designed and used various opportunities to obtain this cherished commodity. By 1875, public education in North Carolina was a legally ordained system of separate facilities, teachers, resources, and students. In North Carolina, black, white, and Indian children all attended segregated public schools until the late 1960s, when “choice” was instituted, followed closely by desegregation (Crow, Escott, & Hatley, 1992).

Segregation and the unequal distribution of financial resources ensured that white children received the bulk of the largesse, while African American and American Indian children suffered without. In addition to African American self-help efforts, noted philanthropic segregationist and mail order catalog mogul, Julius Rosenwald, contributed funds to help build schools for African American children. More than 5,300 Rosenwald schools dotted the South, more than 800 of which were built in North Carolina (Lamon, 1977). Even though the Rosenwald funds were far less than African Americans “were already raising annually to build their own schools” (Gilmore, 1996, p. 164), the money stimulated their construction efforts.

Anna T. Jeanes, another educational philanthropist, contributed funds to pay salaries for industrial supervisors who were called “Jeanes teachers.” Jeanes teachers visited rural African American schools providing information on industrial work, sanitation, and community organizing while helping to increase the overall efficiency of teaching (Lamon, 1977). They also served as supervisors for segregated African American schools, which relieved the white county superintendents of regular oversight responsibilities. Providing both funding and teaching support, Rosenwald and Jeanes, among others, made a significant impact on the education of African American children throughout the rural South while decreasing the overall investment requested from local whites.

Like many teachers in the African American community, Kenion entered the profession with wide-eyed anticipation and unbridled hope. Born in 1912 in rural North Carolina to Alex and Mary Jane Kenion, she grew up with two brothers and one sister. Kenion’s mother worked as a domestic servant for white families to support her children after she and her husband separated. Growing up poor in segregated North Carolina was part of what stimulated Kenion’s commitment to hard work and drive for success. That drive helped her to secure educational scholarships to attend one of the state’s historically black colleges and universities (HBCUs).

Kenion graduated from college in 1941 and immediately sought employment as a teacher in North Carolina’s public schools. Teaching was one of the few professional jobs available to educated African Americans during that time. In addition, Kenion was motivated to improve her personal lot in life, as well as to improve the woefully inadequate school system of which she was a product. Nathan Newbold, North Carolina’s director of Negro education from 1913 to 1950, described the state’s schools for African Americans as having “short, inadequate non-standard school terms … no high schools within a reasonable distance … nearly thousands of teachers … who had not even a good high school education; and many classrooms crowded and congested beyond all hope of serving the children.” He also noted aptly that “it is natural and logical for intelligent Negroes to exhibit feelings of unrest … over conditions which … seem to mean there is no hope for equality of educational opportunities for them in a great State like North Carolina” (quoted in Crow et al., 1992, p. 136).

Kenion was among those determined young college graduates who was unwilling to accept these conditions as a fait accompli. She approached her teaching responsibilities with the will and determination of someone who understood the gravity of her role and who accepted the broad ramifications of teaching African American children in poor rural communities in the South. Kenion began her career teaching 56 children in Grades 1–4 in a “two-teacher school” (Hix, 1983, p. 8A). Nearly 80% of African American schools in the South were one-teacher or two-teacher structures at that time (Fultz, 1995). The school at which Kenion worked was located in an isolated community 20 miles from the nearest town. Kenion recalled that the other teacher in the school was “an aged lady who taught [her] a lot” (Hix, 1983, p. 8A). Kenion was appreciative of the experience and valued the opportunity to teach the children and to hone her craft (Hix, 1983, p. 8A). In her words, “in a way it was good—I had to learn to use the children’s ability and to use my own ability” she recalled. She never stopped learning, and by the time she retired in 1983, she had amassed volumes of educational materials. Kenion was fond of saying, “I’ve got a library in my house and I pushed education all the time” (Hix, 1983, p. 8A).

“Pushing education,” as Kenion uniquely described it, was seen as critical to the African American community’s survival. As an advocate of scholarship, strong communities, and high-quality teaching, Kenion was not unique. Historically, African Americans were in the forefront, demanding that well-trained and highly competent African American teachers be placed before their children. The Journal of Negro Education (Thompson, 1953) noted that on the eve of Brown v. Board of Education, the training of African American teachers was comparable to that of their white counterparts, and in six states, including North Carolina, their training exceeded that of white teachers. But African Americans generally agreed that being as good as whites was never sufficient; they were taught to be “better” in order to reap a modicum of reward.

Kenion taught in the public schools in Duplin County and, at the request of the local county superintendent of public schools, eventually assumed a leadership role in that county. She recalled that the superintendent “made her future” because “he saw worth” in her and gave her an opportunity (Hix, 1983, p. 8A). He named Kenion the general supervisor of Duplin County Schools, a position that she held from 1953 to 1983 (Hix, 1983, p. 8A). In this position, she was in charge of 10 segregated schools that served the county’s African American children (M. L. Carlton, personal communication, June 24, 2010). Kenion was determined to be successful in this new position, which garnered her high visibility, local prestige, and continuous scrutiny.

As a Jeanes teacher, Kenion joined the more than 43 supervisors in North Carolina, who received modest salaries from the Anna T. Jeanes Fund to supervise African American teachers in rural counties and to help to organize parent–teacher associations in those communities (Padgett, 1937). These Jeanes teachers took on varied administrative and supervisory responsibilities. According to the 1958 application for Jeanes Teacher Aid, submitted to supplement her salary, Kenion was to work directly with all the teachers in Duplin County. Her responsibilities included “securing and placing” teachers and principals and supervising their work. For that particular academic year, Kenion was to work with 147 “Negro teachers in the county” (“Application for Jeanes Teacher Aid,” Kenion Papers), and like many Jeanes teachers, Kenion calmly but persistently raised academic standards by pushing her teachers to acquire college degrees and teacher certifications.

Kenion’s work endeared her to many but also evoked distrust and cynicism from some who thought that she was being capricious in her employment decisions. Like many others in similar positions, Kenion chose to use her powers of persuasion and supplication, rather than pressure and confrontation, to get her job done in a racist and segregated rural southern school system. She used these assets and her knowledge of the system to encourage and motivate teachers who were in her charge while never failing to push them to become better educated and more adequately trained. Described as a “versatile and vivacious person” (Hix, 1983, p. 8A), Kenion was plain spoken and assertive, which is evident as she summarized her role and admonition to teachers:

I encourage[d] my teachers to stay with me. I encourage[d] the ones with no certification or low certification to go back to Fayetteville or Elizabeth City [Fayetteville State Teachers College and Elizabeth City State Teachers College were the two HBCU state schools that educated the largest number of African American public school teachers] or someplace … to get their training and do that in the summer. Spend the summer. (A. M. Kenion, personal communication, June 8, 2003)

Some teachers perceived these requests to be unreasonable demands that they resented and resisted. Kenion remembered that “one teacher beat me to the Superintendent’s office and told him what I said.” Superintendent Johnson “told her that he paid her to do like I told her and I didn’t hear anymore from her” (A. M. Kenion, personal communication, June 8, 2003). The young woman proceeded to take Kenion’s advice and to do as she had been instructed. Although some young teachers harbored resentment, others valued Kenion’s prodding and embraced the opportunity to get further education and certification. Irene Carr, a young teacher in the county, recalled in a testimonial note written to Kenion in 1966 that she had “been an outstanding figure in helping many of us reach desired goals” (Kenion Papers). Others, like B. L. Beaty (1966) believed that her “life has been make richer by having worked with such an able leader” as Kenion (Kenion Papers).

Various professional organizations with which Kenion was affiliated also urged African American teachers to improve their educational credentials and to be as prepared as possible. This conversation was taking place throughout the South in African American communities; churches; and civic, social, and professional settings (Siddle Walker, 2001). Many of the state’s HBCUs responded to African American teachers’ needs as well. The North Carolina Teachers Record, the official literary organ of the North Carolina Teachers Association (NCTA), regularly published ads from North Carolina Agricultural and Technical College, Shaw University, and North Carolina College at Durham, encouraging teachers to enroll in their summer school programs. These summer courses targeted principals, supervisors, and teachers. The schools offered several summer sessions of “courses for raising or renewing teachers’ certificates” (North Carolina Teachers Record, March 1951, p. 15). As in other states, African American teachers in North Carolina frequently enrolled in these courses, and, as Siddle Walker (2001) noted, the educational levels increased expeditiously over time.

Kenion was aware that some of the rural, poorly trained teachers lacked motivation and commitment, but she was determined to model appropriate and desired professional behavior. She did not request anything more of her teachers than she was willing to do herself. “I told them that you couldn’t lead people where you didn’t go, so now if you need more instruction to teach, go to summer school and get it,” Kenion recalled. She further indicated that “that was the reason why I was up there [in a position of leadership] where I was because I realized, and I went. I realized that I didn’t know enough in different areas to be somebody’s supervisor, so I went on to school so that I could be qualified to be one” (A. M. Kenion, personal communication, June 8, 2003). This is a reflection of Kenion’s uplift ethos, which seemed to guide her throughout her career in public instruction. Kenion studied at nearly a dozen colleges and universities in the United States, including Fayetteville State Teachers College, where she received her bachelor’s degree; the North Carolina Agricultural and Technical College; Shaw University; Columbia University; Boston University; the University of Pennsylvania; Atlanta University, where she earned a master of arts degree in education in 1944; and North Carolina College for Negroes, where she received a master’s degree in public education in 1946 (Kenion Papers).

There were many other areas in which Kenion tried to encourage teachers. In her mind, teaching in the African American community was an all-encompassing experience in which teachers’ private lives were expected to reflect positively on the teachers’ public roles as schoolteachers. Teachers were revered as role models and respected as the educated elite in the community. Kenion was acutely aware of her teachers’ public images and roles in the community. Her ideas were shared and reinforced by the NCTA, which constantly discussed the teachers’ roles in the schools and the local communities. One article in the North Carolina Teachers Record, entitled, “The ABC’s of Teaching” (Taylor, 1950, p. 15), encouraged teachers to “live in the classroom and the community as you would want your pupils to live.” It also urged teachers to “sell the school programs to the community in order to get community support in building up a better school for the youth of the community” and to “utilize the community and the human resources for the community for … cooperation rather than lip service cooperation. Taylor’s (1950) article, “The ABCs of Teaching,” suggested that efforts to educate African American children and strategies for community involvement and development are cyclical processes that supplement and support each other. It also strongly suggested that African American teachers engage in work to expand the capacity of the community and to build collective efficacy via community organizing. Fisher (2005) described community practice outside social work, without the formal ties to an academic discourse and agency-based relationships, as community organizing. Community practice within social work is community organization. Fisher further noted that community practice outside social work shares some aspects of social work community practice; however, “they exist independent of the social work profession and are heavily influenced by shifts in the political economy and social movements” (p. 36). These teachers’ self-advocacy, as well as their multiple roles on behalf of the children and their families, took them into the community as role models, activists, and organizers. Their work through the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) for pay equity is an example of their advocacy and community organizing.

In rural North Carolina during the 1940s and 1950s, social work community practice was virtually nonexistent, and teachers, like Kenion and other Jeanes teachers, worked doing “the next needed thing” in their communities. This informal motto of the Jeanes teachers—“the next needed thing”—captures the meaning of community practice outside social work and encouraged the supervisor to expand her role variously.

Kenion demonstrated a commitment to the “ABC’s of teaching” in her recruiting and hiring of principals and teachers (although the formal hiring of teachers and principals was the authority of the superintendent, the supervisors of the African American schools had a tremendous influence), and they, in turn, were aware that they were constantly on her radar. Kenion welcomed many young aspirants to her home on Sunday afternoons as they “stopped by” to inquire and to express their interest in a particular principalship or in various teaching positions. Many visited to reassure her that they were committed to their roles and respectfully appreciated her leadership. Others simply visited to ensure that their names were considered when the next opportunity for promotion or reward became available. Some came bearing gifts and others baring their souls. A large number used the Sunday afternoon visits to express their support for Kenion in her challenging role as supervisor. Kenion graciously welcomed them all with an unfettered sense of obligation and a commitment to her professional role and responsibility. Her work in many ways reflected the aspirations of the entire race, a power of which she was sharply aware. As Fairclough (2000, p. 87) noted, “the strengths of black faith in education and the absence of black political leadership in the age of segregation meant that the aspirations of the race fell heavily on the shoulders of teachers.”

With this responsibility as a constant and with little support, save the local ministers or the African American agricultural extension agent, teachers, principals, and supervisors embraced their particular brand of community organizing as the mechanism by which to “render invaluable assistance to the public welfare” of their communities (Larkins, 1945, p. 15). John R. Larkins, consultant on Negro work for the North Carolina State Board of Public Welfare from 1942 to 1962, further noted that “teachers do a great deal of social work in their job everyday and realize the importance of social work services” (1945, p. 4). Teachers were expected to concentrate on improving the conditions under which people lived. Essentially, they were expected to be “activist” and to work “in the classroom and … directly with the people of the community” (Fultz, 1995, p. 406). Supervisors were both to role model this expected behavior and to ensure that teachers understood what was expected of them.

As an advocate for equal rights and access, Kenion knew the value of a well-placed word and understood networking and the importance of affiliation. She joined many professional, civic, and civil rights organizations, including the NCTA and the NAACP, of which she became a life member. The NAACP was active in her area of the state and billed itself as one of the strongest chapters in the region. It supported teachers’ struggles for equitable salaries, and by the time Kenion graduated from college in the early 1940s, the NAACP had won half its lawsuits for salary parity on behalf of African American teachers (Perkins, 1989).

Kenion was proud of her affiliation with the NCTA and maintained membership until her death in 2009. The NCTA, founded in 1881, was one of the largest and most influential teachers’ organizations in the country. From its beginning, it advocated for equal rights for African American teachers, suggested strategies for improving teacher education and training, and urged teachers to contribute to the local consciousness of the larger communities. One article in the North Carolina Teachers Record, entitled “The Teacher and the Ballot” (Daly, 1946), indicated that teachers should vote and “should be able to give a demonstration both for registering and for voting” (p. 7). The article urged teachers to, “without fanfare or campaigning, but quietly, intelligently and fearlessly,” take full part in each election (Daly, 1946, p. 7). Kenion was active with this organization and supported her teachers’ and principals’ membership and involvement as they sought election to various offices in the organization. Joining the NCTA and the NAACP took tremendous courage and involved genuine risk for Kenion and her teachers; they were putting their jobs on the line and sometimes their lives (Fairclough, 2000). Although Kenion may have been guarded in her vocal advocacy for social justice, her tenacious prodding and strategic efforts to improve educational opportunities and life chances for African American children, their teachers, and their communities supported her commitment to the goal of racial uplift.

Keeping Teachers

In an effort to ensure that new teachers in the rural North Carolina community were safely housed, Kenion was committed to “keeping teachers” as a service to both the teachers and to the community. The phrase keeping teachers is derived from “board and keep.” It was the practice of families in the community to open their homes to teachers who relocated to isolated and/or poor areas to accept teaching positions. Kenion recalled that she began to keep teachers when one of the local principals, whom she supervised, asked her to house one of the new teachers who had joined his faculty (A. M. Kenion, personal communication, June 8, 2003). She acquiesced to his request, which began her career as a landlord with an exclusive tenant population—public school teachers.

Kenion provided rooms to young, usually single and mostly female, teachers who had moved to her small rural county to accept new teaching positions. She also provided housing for college women who were assigned to do practice teaching in the county and were completing their degrees in teacher education at her alma mater some 50 miles away.

The lack of housing was a serious problem, and it was often a major factor in determining whether these new teachers accepted a job offer. There were no apartments or homes to lease in these areas, particularly for African American teachers. When housing was available, strict rules of segregation eliminated the possibility that these young women could find suitable housing without rooming in private family homes. Families, like Kenion’s, who could best afford it, were expected to open their homes for a modest fee to new teachers who were relocating to their communities. As we noted, in some cases, the local principal, who knew that her or his ability to attract good teachers depended on the availability of suitable housing, would solicit rooms in advance to entice the prospective teachers. Affordable living space with decent and reputable families was part of the benefits package that was made available to new teachers as an incentive to accept the teaching jobs. By keeping teachers, Kenion was participating in a practice that had a long-respected history in the African American community.

The biographies of prominent African American women have often recounted the experiences of boarding with both humor and dread. Mamie Garvin Fields, author of Lemon Swamp and Other Places: A Carolina Memoir (1983), graphically recounted her early experiences with boarding in the South Carolina Sea Islands when she first began to teach. Fields’s housing escapades took her from “one of the better houses ... a shotgun house” to a root doctor’s house to a fly-infested home where wood rats graced the dinner table as the main course (p. 108).

Journalist, teacher, and social activist, Ida Bell Wells-Barnett, remembered her boarding experiences with families in Memphis. She boarded with several older women and prominent families in the city and felt that finding a suitable room from “respectable” people was a chore. Her constant need to find affordable and suitable housing near her teaching post prompted Wells-Barnett to lament, “I am sick and tired begging people to take me to board” (quoted in McMurry, 1998, p. 42). Others, such as the renowned activist and educator Anna Julia Cooper (Hutchinson, 1993) and centenarian sisters Sarah and Bessie Delany (Delany & Delany, 1983) all of Raleigh, North Carolina, shared similar stories in which they endured challenging boarding situations with various families to fulfill teaching commitments in African American schools.

With young teachers living around her, some in her home and others in an adjacent boarding house on her property, Kenion was uniquely positioned to socialize and acculturate these new educators. She embraced this new venture with the same zeal and determination that was her character. She recalled that she gained a lot from being around the young women whom she boarded. She also used the experience as an opportunity to help them learn to live in the local community, to understand and appreciate the local cultural norms, and to engage in community practice as part of their unique role in these communities. She believed that the young teachers embraced each other as sisters, learning from and supporting one another (A. M. Kenion, personal communication, June 8, 2003). Kenion believed that the principals expected her to do so and that she was obligated to provide this service in the interest of high-quality education for African American children.

Kenion instructed the teachers that they were expected to be visible in the community. She pushed the young teachers to attend local church services. She said that “no one in the community expects you to have to go every Sunday, but we would expect you to go to church frequently.” She encouraged them to “let the students and the parents see you there, and they would get closer to you” (A. M. Kenion, personal communication, June 8, 2003). Moreover, attending church would give the teachers opportunities to meet and interact with the children’s parents and to develop relationships with them. Kenion believed it was important for the teachers to visit various churches and Sunday schools to get to know as many students and parents as possible while extending themselves to the larger community.

Kenion became the unofficial monitor and mentor of the African American teachers under her supervision. Because of her position of influence and prominence, she was sometimes called upon to encourage teachers to pay their “credit accounts” at local department or drug stores. If the teachers were slow paying their bills, the store proprietors would speak with their principals, who would then speak with Kenion. Kenion would talk with the teachers about their obligations and expected behavior and the importance of having good credit and a “good name” in the community (A. M. Kenion, personal interview, June 8, 2003). She thought that these teachers’ behaviors were a reflection of her and of the larger African American community and that good positive relationships were essential. Her interpersonal relationships with community leaders, local clergy, and businesswomen and businessmen allowed her to intervene on behalf of the teachers under her supervision.

In sum, Kenion’s career success demonstrates that dignity was attainable even in a racist and segregated system and that self-improvement and education were avenues toward justice and equality. Furthermore, understanding and appreciating Kenion’s story requires that race fit prominently in the analysis of power (Carlton-LaNey, 1994). Despite segregation and oppression, Kenion remained noble and strong in a job that was almost untenable and emotionally challenging at best. She could not maintain anonymity, but had to present herself, exposed and unprotected, to public criticism from the African American community and to condemnation, both overt and covert, from the white community, which was determined to maintain the status quo. Her work involved numerous measures to inform the isolated African American community of social issues, policies, and services; to stimulate community responses to social injustices; and to ensure the best possible education for poor rural African American children.