African Dorcas Association 295eff orts, but also provided a brief glimpse into their early ac-
tivities. Th e women divided into sewing circles, which met
every two weeks, to make and repair clothes for schoolchil-
dren. In the meantime, they dedicated themselves to solicit-
ing contributions. Th e newspaper admired the women for
their praiseworthy participation and encouraged others to
support the eff ort.
Despite the group’s excellent work, the advisory com-
mittee had perhaps foreseen that the women of the Dorcas
Association would come under public attack. By September
1828, Freedom’s Journal spoke of antagonism toward the Af-
rican Dorcas Association in veiled language. It is unclear
who their enemies were, or how the antipathy manifested
itself, but the newspaper acknowledged the Dorcas Socie-
ty’s enemies and urged the women to remain committed
to their important endeavor. Regardless of the criticisms
launched against the African Dorcas Association, the or-
ganization fl ourished. In November 1828, the association
was again praised for its labor. An anonymous author called
“Cato” wrote an article celebrating the women’s success and
pleaded with the New York community to assist the socie-
ty’s work on behalf of children. Freedom’s Journal’s editor
echoed the praise, remarking on the association’s deter-
mination to exert every eff ort to assist poor black children
to attend school and advance the race. By February 1829,
the organization was able to report some accomplish-
ments. Th e women had managed to distribute 168 articles
of clothing and clothe 64 boys and girls. As result, these
underprivileged children were aff orded the opportunity to
pursue education and, hopefully, improve the future of the
black community.
Th e African Dorcas Association revealed a great deal
about the gender dynamics within New York’s black activist
community. On the surface, the association and its focus
on children’s education strongly conformed to white repub-
lican notions about the proper roles for women. It was, in
fact, a form of activism that refl ected mothering and nur-
turing and was therefore not particularly threatening to the
status quo. However, the activities of the African Dorcas
Association also refl ected a black ethic, in which people
collectively contributed their skills in order to uplift the
community. Because it had been determined that children
were not attending school because they did not possess
adequate clothing, black women simply put their skills to
work on behalf of the race. Th ese strategies mirrored Afri-
can cultural practices, in which men and women performedAfrican Dorcas Association
Th e African Dorcas Association was founded in New York
City in January 1828, as part of the black community’s on-
going commitment to education and racial advancement.
Although New York City’s black children had the benefi t of
the African Free School system, attendance at the schools
suff ered because of extreme poverty in the community.
In the late 1820s, members of the black leadership sought
to ascertain the causes behind lagging enrollment in the
school system because they fi rmly believed that educational
success would determine the future of race. Once activists
discovered that low attendance was due to the children’s
lack of appropriate attire during the cold winter months,
they solicited support from women to create an organiza-
tion for the purpose of making, altering, and distributing
clothes to impoverished children.
Th erefore, on January 23, 1828, black female activists,
along with a group of black ministers and white abolition-
ists, met to form the African Dorcas Association. Cognizant
that there would be some public resistance to a female orga-
nization involved in education, black ministers, including
Samuel Cornish and Peter Williams Jr., agreed to serve as a
governing board to the African Dorcas Association. Indeed,
the ministers’ infl uence on the organization was clear from
the beginning. Th e advisory group off ered assistance and
public legitimacy to the association by keeping the records,
receiving donations, and setting the meetings. Moreover,
even the organization’s name had a religious association.
Dorcas was a Biblical fi gure, found in the Book of Acts, who
made clothes for the poor in her village, clearly a reference
that refl ected the organization’s founding mission.
Yet despite the strong male infl uence on the asso-
ciation’s early activities, the women of the African Dorcas
Association soon began to exercise more power over the or-
ganization’s functioning. In February 1828, Dorcas women
held their fi rst independent meeting, during which they
elected Margaret Francis as their president and a board of
managers composed entirely of women. Th ey also draft ed a
constitution, which reiterated their primary goal to provide
clothing and other necessary items for poor students who
could not aff ord their own. Less than a month aft er its fi rst
meeting, the African Dorcas Association was already re-
ceiving praise for its activities. An article in the black news-
paper Freedom’s Journal not only applauded the women’s