by Sonya Bernard-Hollins, publisher- Community Voices
160-year old Ladies Library to Host Youth Magazine Unveiling
(Inset photo: Pilot Monique Grayson congratulates Travel Writers Asia Taylor, Makaila Morris, and Natasha Mahonie on their first flights at the Air Zoo).
KALAMAZOO (MICH.)- A dozen African-American girls gathered on the stage of the Ladies Library Association to
rehearse for their awards ceremony and magazine unveiling event. As they giggled and danced around in fun, they had no idea they were making history. As a part of the Merze Tate Travel Club, they would become the youngest and most culturally diverse group ever to partner with the more than 160-year-old Ladies Library Association.
The magazine is the result of a collaborative partnership between the five-year-old Merze Tate Travel Club, the Ladies
Library Association and the Black Arts and Cultural Center, which offered 12 inner-city girls ages 9-16 the opportunity to participate in a residential travel writers academy on the campus of Kalamazoo College (July 7-13). With the assistance of various sponsors such a MLive Group, Lewis Walker Institute at Western Michigan University, Community Voices, and the Links, Inc., the girls did everything from create a Writing Center in the garden of Pretty Lake Vacation Camp, to fly above their city and meet an African American female commercial pilot.
The academy was named the Tate-Stone Travel Writers Academy based on Merze Tate and Lucinda Hinsdale Stone. Tate, a 1927 graduate of Western Michigan University and the first African American to graduate from Oxford University, founded a travel club in the 1930s at Crispus Attucks High School in Indianapolis. She funded trips for African American to learn about their country as they visited such places as Niagara Falls and Washington D.C.
Stone, came to Kalamazoo with her husband, James, to help establish what is now Kalamazoo College. Stone also helped found the Ladies Library Association, Womens Press Association, and many other clubs in the late 1800s. Stone also lobbied for the first female student to be accepted to the University of Michigan, and created a study abroad program for girls which took them on education excursions to Europe and Africa.
Both women traveled the world, wrote as travel writers, were philanthropists, and were dedicated to the education of
young women; making the name of the academy one dedicated to them both. The Oct. 4th event will be an unveiling of
not only a magazine, but a new face, 21st century face of what women can become. We would love to have you cover this historic event.
For more information regarding this event or applications for student enrollment or sponsorship opportunities, contact Sonya Bernard-Hollins at 269-365-4019, or e-mail editor@comvoicesonline.com.
