✍🏾: @tiff.chey
Alice Dunnigan and Ethel Payne were both granddaughters of slaves, but eventually became a physical manifestation of their ancestors’ wildest dreams. They were the first Black women to become members of the White House press corps while in the middle of 20th-century segregation!
In her thirties, Dunnigan had been writing a regular column for a local paper, but felt that she could do more to voice the truth in the times they were living. This motivated her to pursue a broader platform to report and eventually got a job writing for the Associated Negro Press in Washington, D.C. In 1947, she became the first Black woman reporter qualified to cover the White House.
Payne’s motivation to pursue her journalism career came after being denied admission to law school because of her skin color. In 1951, she became a Washington reporter for the Chicago Defender and later reported as the First Lady of the Black Press. She was very impressionable, because she asked all of the hard questions. Payne later became the first Black woman commentator at CBS News.
Now, these trailblazing Black queens will be honored as their families will receive the inaugural Dunnigan-Payne Prize for Lifetime Career Achievement on their behalf for their outstanding achievements in journalism.
“She knocked the door down,” Alicia Dunnigan said of her grandmother. “I marvel at all that she did, all that she was, and all that she fought for.”
Payne passed in 1991 and Dunnigan passed in 1983.
These women knocked down doors and inspired those after them with their hard work and dedication. Congratulations to them and their families! #BWLM💕
