Feminist, Gender, and Sexuality Studies Commons^™

Mary Ann Shadd Cary And Kit Coleman: The Shifting Public Memory Of Canadian Female Journalism, Josie Smith

AWE (A Woman’s Experience)

Susa Young Gates Award Essay

Honorable Mention

On June 30, 1855, Mary Ann Shadd Cary, a free black woman from a prominent black family and editor of The Provincial Freeman (a black abolitionist newspaper printed in Chatham, Ontario, Canada) wrote the following to identify her own achievements in journalism: “To colored women, we have a word—we have broken the Editorial ice, whether willingly or not, for your class in America, so go to Editing as many of you as are willing and able.” Shadd Cary did indeed break the “Editorial ice” as the first black female newspaper editor in both …