| Alcenya Crowley | |
|---|---|
| Born | Alcenya McElwain (1926-04-26)April 26, 1926 St. Paul, Minnesota, United States |
| Died | September 12, 2010 Mississauga, Ontario, Canada |
| Nationality | American, Canadian |
| Other names | Alcenya Crowley-Morrow |
| Occupation(s) | Educator Activist |
Alcenya Crowley (April 3, 1926 – September 12, 2010), born Alcenya McElwain, was an American-born Canadian educator and activist.
Early life and education
Alcenya McElwain was born in St. Paul, Minnesota, the daughter of William McElwain. She was educated at the Minneapolis School of Business. She later studied marketing at Ryerson Polytechnical Institute and earned a degree in political science from York University.
Career
Crowley worked in a law office, in an accountant's office, at the Metropolitan Children's Aid Society, and then as a secretary for the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation. She later taught business for the Toronto District School Board, retiring in 1991.
Crowley joined the Canadian Negro Women's Association (CANEWA), later the Congress of Black Women of Canada. She served as vice-president from 1957 to 1958 and as president from 1959 to 1960. She chaired CANEWA's first Calypso Carnival, drawing on the cultures of the organization's Caribbean-born members. She represented CANEWA at the funeral of Martin Luther King Jr.
Personal life
She married a Canadian podiatrist, William Richard "Buddy" Crowley, in 1951, and moved to Toronto with him.
Crowley was widowed when her husband died in 1963; she died in Credit Valley Hospital in 2010, at the age of 84.
References
- "Alcenya McElwain from Ward 12 St. Paul in 1940 Census District 90-294". 1940 US Census. Retrieved 2020-06-02.
- ^ Hill, Lawrence (1996). Women of Vision: The Story of the Canadian Negro Women's Association, 1951–1976. Dundurn. pp. 35–36. ISBN 1895642183.
- Wane, Njoki Nathani; Deliovsky, Katerina; Lawson, Erica (2002). Back to the Drawing Board: African-Canadian Feminisms. Canadian Scholars’ Press. p. 40. ISBN 978-1-894549-17-2.
- "African Canadian Anti-Discrimination Activism and the Transnational Civil Rights Movement, 1945–1965". Journal of the Canadian Historical Association. 24 (3): 386–424. 2013.
- "Obituaries". The Windsor Star. 1963-03-29. p. 5. Retrieved 2020-06-02 – via Newspapers.com.
- "Alcenya Crowley-Morrow". Toronto Star. September 15, 2010.
External links
- Alcenya Crowley at Find a Grave
- Funké Omotunde Aladejebi, "'Girl You Better Apply to Teachers’ College': The History of Black Women Educators in Ontario, 1940s –1980s" (Ph.D. dissertation, York University 2016).