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Sadie Tanner Mossell Alexander (January 2, 1898 – November 1, 1989) was a pioneering Black professional and civil rights activist of the early-to-mid-20th century. In 1921, Mossell Alexander was the second African-American woman to receive a Ph.D. and the first one to receive one in economics in the United States. In 1927, she was first Black woman to receive a law degree from the University of Pennsylvania Law School and went on to become the first Black woman to practice law in the state. She was also the first national president of Delta Sigma Theta sorority, serving from 1919 to 1923.Mossell Alexander and her husband were active in civil rights, both in Philadelphia and nationally. In 1946 she was appointed to the President's Committee on Civil Rights established by Harry Truman. In 1952 she was appointed to the city's Commission on Human Relations, serving through 1968. She was a founding member of the national Lawyers' Committee for Civil Rights Under Law (1963). She served on the board of the National Urban League for 25 years. U.S. President Jimmy Carter named her in 1979 to chair the decennial White House Conference on Aging, an appointment later withdrawn by Richard Schweiker, President Ronald Reagan's Secretary of Health and Human Services. Biography Sadie Tanner Mossell was born on January 2, 1898, in Philadelphia to Aaron Albert Mossell II and Mary Louisa Tanner (born 1867). Mossell attended high school in Washington, D.C. at the M Street School, now known as Dunbar High School, graduating in 1915. She was able to do so because she stayed with her uncle Dr. Lewis B Moore and step aunt at their home on the campus of Howard University. Mossell returned to Philadelphia to study at the School of Education at the University of Pennsylvania, graduating in 1918. There, she faced numerous hardships, due to her race and gender, such as poor advising, false accusations of plagiarism, and other students stealing her intellectual property. She pursued graduate work in economics, also at Penn, earning her master's in 1919. Awarded the Francis Sergeant Pepper fellowship, she was able to continue her studies and in 1921 became the first African-American woman in the United States to earn a PhD from an American university.Finding it difficult to get professorship work in Philadelphia as an African-American even with her doctorate, Mossell decided to take an actuarial job with the black-owned North Carolina Mutual Life Insurance Company in Durham, North Carolina, and worked there for two years. In 1919, she was elected the first national President of Delta Sigma Theta. Mossell Alexander also served as the legal advisor to Delta Sigma Theta sorority for 35 years. She was in contact with the Alpha Chapter of Delta Sigma Theta since 1915 when she arrived at the University of Pennsylvania. However, she needed five students to charter a chapter of the sorority, which was not possible until 1918. In March 1918, the Gamma Chapter of Delta Sigma Theta was established with Mossell as its first President. At the request of the Alpha Chapter, the four existing chapters of Delta Sigma Theta were called to convene at Howard University in December 1919. The sorority planned to host their meetings in the women's dormitory on campus until Mossell's uncle Lewis Baxter Moore offered his office as a meeting place. At this convention, the Grand Chapter of the sorority was established, taking the sorority from a loose federation of chapters to a national body. Under Mossell's leadership the Sorority expanded to new locales in the West, the South, and further into the Midwest and Northeast. She also initiated Delta's first national program, May Week.In 1923, Mossell married Raymond Pace Alexander shortly after he was admitted to the bar, then returned with him to Philadelphia. Mossell received job offers from several Black colleges and universities, but none of them was located in Philadelphia, and she had no desire to leave her new family. So she stayed home for a year, did volunteer work, and eventually entered law school.She was the first African-American woman admitted to the University of Pennsylvania Law School. While a law student, the dean attempted to deny her participation on the law review, but her fellow students – including Philip Werner Amram, who was then editor-in-chief of the University of Pennsylvania Law Review – insisted that she be allowed this honor, which she had earned. In 1927, she was Penn's first African-American woman graduate, and the first to be admitted to the Pennsylvania Bar.Mossell Alexander practiced law from 1927 until her retirement in 1982. Upon admission to the Bar, she joined her husband's law practice as partner, specializing in estate and family law. They both were active in civil rights law as well. In 1928 she was the first African-American woman appointed as Assistant City Solicitor for the City of Philadelphia, serving to 1930. She was reappointed from 1934 to 1938. From 1943 to 1947, she was the first woman to serve as secretary of the National Bar Association. She was appointed to the Commission on Human Relations of the City of Philadelphia, serving from 1952 to 1968. In 1959, when her husband was appointed to the Court of Common Pleas in Philadelphia, she opened her own law office. She continued to practice law independently until her husband's death in 1974. In 1976, she joined the firm of Atkinson, Myers, and Archie as a general counsel, where she remained until her retirement. Mossell Alexander died on November 1, 1989, at Cathedral Village in Andorra, Philadelphia, from pneumonia as a complication from Alzheimer's disease. She was buried in West Laurel Hill Cemetery. Family Her maternal grandfather was Benjamin Tucker Tanner (1835–1923), a bishop in the African Methodist Episcopal Church (AME) and editor of the Christian Recorder. Bishop Tanner and his wife Sarah Elizabeth Tanner had seven children, including Henry Ossawa Tanner (1859–1937), who became a noted painter, and Hallie Tanner Johnson, the first female physician to practice medicine in Alabama and who established the Nurses' School and Hospital at the Tuskegee Institute in Alabama.Her father, Aaron Albert Mossell II (1863-1951), was the first African-American graduate of the University of Pennsylvania School of Law and practiced as a lawyer in Philadelphia. In 1899, when his daughter Sadie was a one year old, he abandoned his family and moved to Wales. Her uncle, Nathan Francis Mossell (1856–1946) was the first African-American graduate of the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine.Mossell Alexander's siblings include Aaron Albert Mossell III (1893–1975), who became a pharmacist; and Elizabeth Mossell (1894–1975), who became a Dean of Women at Virginia State College, a historically black college.During her high school years, Mossell lived in Washington, DC, with her uncle, Lewis Baxter Moore, who was dean at Howard University and her step aunt Lavinia W. Moore.On N.... Discover the M Alexander popular books. Find the top 100 most popular M Alexander books.

Best Seller M Alexander Books of 2024

  • F.M. Alexander synopsis, comments

    F.M. Alexander

    Nancy Crego

    The teaching aphorisms of F.M. Alexander

  • Suddenly Sixty synopsis, comments

    Suddenly Sixty

    Judith Viorst

    Judith Viorst is known and loved by readers of all ages, for children’s books such as Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day; nonfiction titles, including the ...

  • The Mimosa Tree Mystery synopsis, comments

    The Mimosa Tree Mystery

    Ovidia Yu

    LONGLISTED FOR THE CWA HISTORICAL DAGGER'Simply glorious. Every nook and cranny of 1930s Singapore is brought richly to life' CATRIONA MCPHERSON 'Charming' RHYS BOWEN'One of the mo...

  • The Matter of Black Lives synopsis, comments

    The Matter of Black Lives

    Jelani Cobb & David Remnick

    A collection of The New Yorker‘s groundbreaking writing on race in Americaincluding work by James Baldwin, Toni Morrison, TaNehisi Coates, Hilton Als, Zadie Smith, and morewit...

  • The American Story synopsis, comments

    The American Story

    David M. Rubenstein

    Cofounder of The Carlyle Group and patriotic philanthropist David M. Rubenstein takes readers on a sweeping journey across the grand arc of the American story through revealing con...

  • Matter Estate Nancy M. Alexander v. Lee S. synopsis, comments

    Matter Estate Nancy M. Alexander v. Lee S.

    Supreme Court of North Dakota

    This is an appeal from the judgment of August 3, 1961 of the Circuit Court of Adair County in the matter of the Estate of Nancy M. Alexander, Deceased. It involves the objections o...

  • Unexpectedly Eighty synopsis, comments

    Unexpectedly Eighty

    Judith Viorst

    Judith Viorst returns with more poems in her “Decades” poetry series detailing the highs and lows of being an octogenarian. Continuing the comedic insight from I’m Too Young to be ...

  • Red Litten World synopsis, comments

    Red Litten World

    K. M. Alexander

    The city of Lovat is dying. It just doesn’t know it yet. Trapped behind blockades, its citizens starve. Only the wealthiest can afford to snatch up what food does slip through, lea...

  • The Iliad synopsis, comments

    The Iliad

    Homer & Caroline Alexander

    With her virtuoso translation, classicist and bestselling author Caroline Alexander brings to life Homer’s timeless epic of the Trojan WarComposed around 730 B.C., Homer’s Iliad re...

  • Alexander M. Rosenfeld v. Tpi International Airways synopsis, comments

    Alexander M. Rosenfeld v. Tpi International Airways

    Court of Appeal of Florida

    Antonio Chestnut and several others were "beating up on a cab driver" outside a convenience store when Roger Hicks pulled up in his truck delivering milk. Chestnut grabbed Hicks an...

  • Necessary Losses synopsis, comments

    Necessary Losses

    Judith Viorst

    From grief and mourning to aging and relationships, poet and Redbook contributor Judith Viorst presents a thoughtful and researched study in this examination of love, loss, and let...

  • Old Broken Road synopsis, comments

    Old Broken Road

    K. M. Alexander

    It’s called the Broken Road. A long abandoned route veiled in rumor, only spoken of in whispers. Some claim that bandits stalk its overgrown path, while others speak of a city of c...

  • The Cannonball Tree Mystery synopsis, comments

    The Cannonball Tree Mystery

    Ovidia Yu

    'One of Singapore's finest living authors' South China Morning Post'Simply glorious. Every nook and cranny of 1930s Singapore is brought richly to life' CATRIONA MCPHERSON'Charming...

  • John M. Alexander and Helen Alexander V. synopsis, comments

    John M. Alexander and Helen Alexander V.

    Supreme Court Of Utah

    Defendants, through their agent, Boyd Sorensen, sold plaintiffs a subdivision lot in Provo. The recorded subdivision plat positioned the subject lot adjacent to a main road to the ...

  • The Paper Bark Tree Mystery synopsis, comments

    The Paper Bark Tree Mystery

    Ovidia Yu

    SHORTLISTED FOR THE CWA SAPERE BOOKS HISTORICAL DAGGER'Simply glorious. Every nook and cranny of 1930s Singapore is brought richly to life' CATRIONA MCPHERSON 'Charming' RHYS BOWEN...

  • Searsey v. Perry M. Alexander Construction Co. synopsis, comments

    Searsey v. Perry M. Alexander Construction Co.

    Court of Appeals of North Carolina No. 7728IC106

    [35 NCApp Page 79] Defendants attack the Commissioner's award as invalid because the plaintiff's injury was caused not by an accident but by an expected, foreseen event which was p...

  • Nearing Ninety synopsis, comments

    Nearing Ninety

    Judith Viorst

    The newest illustrated poetry collection in beloved author Judith Viorst’s “decade” series (from It’s Hard to Be Hip Over Thirty to Unexpectedly Eighty), exploring, with her signat...

  • Alexander M. Lawrence and Others, Claimants of the Ship Hornet, Appellants v. Charles Minturn synopsis, comments

    Alexander M. Lawrence and Others, Claimants of the Ship Hornet, Appellants v. Charles Minturn

    United States Supreme Court

    THIS was an appeal from a decree of the district court of the United States for the northern district of California, sitting in admiralty. Minturn libelled The Hornet, for the nond...

  • Christmas at Thrush Green synopsis, comments

    Christmas at Thrush Green

    Miss Read

    A brand new Miss Read novel, set in the Cotswold village of Thrush Green at Christmas.The villagers of Thrush Green celebrate Christmas traditionally, in a way that has hardly chan...

  • Matter Alexander H. Massey v. Gordon M. Ambach synopsis, comments

    Matter Alexander H. Massey v. Gordon M. Ambach

    Supreme Court of New York

    [135 A.D.2d 1054 Page 1054] Proceeding pursuant to CPLR article 78 (initiated in this court pursuant to Education Law [135 A.D.2d 1054 Page 1055]

  • Proof of Heaven by Eben Alexander III M.D. - A 30-minute Chapter-by-Chapter Summary synopsis, comments

    Proof of Heaven by Eben Alexander III M.D. - A 30-minute Chapter-by-Chapter Summary

    InstaRead Summaries

    With InstaRead ChapterbyChapter Summaries, you can get the essence of a book in 30 minutes or less. We read every chapter and summarize it in one or two paragraphs so you can get t...

  • Tricky Dick synopsis, comments

    Tricky Dick

    Roger Stone & Mike Colapietro

    Finally, there is a "warts and all" biography of the most enduring American politician of the 20th century Richard Milhous Nixon written by an author with unprecedented access and ...

  • Alexander M. Peltz Et Al. Plaintiffs in Error v. Joseph S. Clarke synopsis, comments

    Alexander M. Peltz Et Al. Plaintiffs in Error v. Joseph S. Clarke

    United States Supreme Court

    This was an ejectment brought by the plaintiffs in error against the defendant, in the circuit court of the United States for the district of Columbia. The plaintiffs, who are the ...

  • The Betel Nut Tree Mystery synopsis, comments

    The Betel Nut Tree Mystery

    Ovidia Yu

    'Great protagonist, great setting this is a delightful book' Morning Star The second novel in Ovidia Yu's delightfully charming crime series set in 1930s Singapore, featuring amat...

  • The Frangipani Tree Mystery synopsis, comments

    The Frangipani Tree Mystery

    Ovidia Yu

    First in a delightfully charming crime series set in 1930s Singapore, introducing amateur sleuth Su Lin, a local girl stepping in as governess for the Acting Governor of Singapore...

  • The Stars Were Right synopsis, comments

    The Stars Were Right

    K. M. Alexander

    Caravan Master Waldo Bell didn’t expect to return home a criminal. He just wanted a relaxing month off between jobs so he could explore the city of Lovat, enjoy a soft bed and a fe...