Who is Maggie Lena Walker?

Maggie Walker Biography

Maggie Lena Walker was an African-American businesswoman, civil activist, teacher, and entrepreneur. She was born on July 15, 1864, in Richmond, Virginia. She was the first African-American lady president of a chartered bank in the United States of America. She completed her graduation from the Armstrong Normal School (1883). She was a teacher at the Lancaster School until her marriage to Armstead Walker in 1886.

She joined the Grand United Order of St. Luke, an African American fraternal and co-operative insurance society. Society offered educational and financial support to African-Americans. As a community leader, she achieved success and made remarkable improvements in the way of life for African Americans and women in the late 19th and early 20th centuries.

Maggie Lena Walker Facts

• Maggie Lena Walker was the first black woman banker of the United States.
• Maggie Lena Walker was one of the most prominent women business leaders in the United States.
• In 1937, Maggie L. Walker High School was established to honor her. But the high school was abandoned in 2001. It was reopened again as Maggie L. Walker Governor’s School for Government and International education.
• Street and theatre are also honored in her name· Maggie was active in civic communities.
• Walker established a newspaper called St. Luke Herald and also founded the St. Luke Emporium, the St. Luke Penny Savings Bank, and department store on the part of the Independent Order of St. Luke.
• She was the chairman of the board of Trust Company and the Consolidated Bank.

Maggie Lena Walker Quotes

Let’s have look at her famous quotes-

“The poetry of a people comes from the deep recesses of the unconscious, the irrational and the collective body of our ancestral memories.”

“No person is your friend who demands your silence, or denies your right to grow.”

“When I was about eight, I decided that the most wonderful thing, next to a human being, was a book.”

“Friends and good manners will carry you where money won’t go.”

“Let a new earth rise. Let another world be born. Let a bloody peace be written in the sky. Let a second generation full of courage issue forth; let a people loving freedom comes to growth.”

Death and (Maggie Walker House Given to Future People)

During the last few years of Walker’s life, she was restricted to a wheelchair and was suffering from diabetes. In 1934 she died from complications of the disease, at the age of 70. Maggie L. Walker is buried in Evergreen Cemetery in Richmond. The Maggie L. Walker National Historic Site preserves her home.