As we celebrate Women’s History Month, Delaware State University is fast approaching its 130th anniversary, making it a good time to recognize the women prominent in the story of the First State’s only historically Black institution of higher education.
After the Delaware College for Colored Students opened for classes in 1892, the first four female students — Sarah A. Dutton, Rachel A. Dutton, Emma L. Moliston and Amanda Robinson — enrolled in the fall of 1894. At first admitted as “day students,” the following year then-college President William C. Jason made residential provisions for young women at the President’s House.
While many other colleges in the country restricted enrollment to one gender or the other, President Jason made his position on that clear in his first report to the Board of Trustees by asserting, “I believe in coeducation.” A year after the first two males graduated from the college, Cora Moore graduate in 1899.
First woman employed
In 1897, President Jason hired Lydia P. Laws as the first woman to be employed at what was then named the State College for Colored Students. Serving as residential matron for the growing number of female students, the native of Frederica and graduate of Clark College in Atlanta was also an instructor of teacher education and domestic sciences. Her role in overseeing the welfare of the young women on campus became especially important with the 1901 construction of the first female dormitory, Lore Hall.
She served the college for 17 years, leaving in 1914 to care for her then-new husband. She is part of the dual namesake for the Tubman-Laws Residential Hall, completed in 2019.
Other remarkable women follow Laws in Delaware State history.
Cora W. Warren also spent her 25-year career at the college looking after the women on campus. From 1944 to her retirement in 1969, she served as a residential hall director and dean of women. A motivating force and motherly figure for all students, she is a namesake for the Warren Franklin Residential Hall on campus.
Dr. Harriet Ruth Williams, a native of Cheswold, graduated in 1930 from the State College High School and then, in 1934, from the State College for Colored Students with a Bachelor of Science degree in biology. After earning a Master of Science degree from Atlanta University, she returned to Delaware State in 1944 to begin a 52-year career. In addition to being head of the college’s Chemistry Department, she also served in a number of interim administrative positions over her career. In 1970, she became the first woman awarded an honorary doctorate by the institution.
Women on the board
The college’s Board of Trustees was all-male for its first 57 years, until Beatrice Berryman broke that gender line in 1948 as the first female board member. The same year, she was the first woman to serve as the board’s vice president.
Other women were appointed to the board in subsequent years, two of note: In 1971, Gov. Russell Peterson appointed Delma Lafferty to the board, who, at age 23 and a 1969 graduate of the University of Delaware, became the youngest Delaware State trustee appointed. In 1980, Dr. Cora Selby was appointed to the board, serving as trustee for 27 years, longest of any woman on the board.
In 2017, Dr. Wilma Mishoe — daughter of Delaware State’s seventh president, Dr. Luna Mishoe — became the first woman elected as chair of the Delaware State University Board of Trustees. With the election of Dr. Devona Williams as board vice chairperson, it marked the first time that the top two board officers were women.
With the resignation of Dr. Harry L. Williams as president, the board appointed Dr. Mishoe acting president at the beginning of 2018 and then, six months later, named her president — making her the first female chief executive in the university’s history, a post she would serve in until her retirement at the end of 2019. With Dr. Mishoe’s elevation to president, Dr. Devona Williams became the board’s chairperson, a position she continues to hold.
Dr. Williams notes that when she became a trustee in 2012, the board was male-dominated in number and culture, with only two of its 15 members women. Currently, there are eight women serving as trustees.
“I made it a priority to encourage recruitment of women leaders to the board who are aligned with the strategic vision of DSU and have a passion for the mission,” Dr. Williams said. “In my role as chair, I am proud to say that the board is almost evenly divided between men and women. With the trend in higher education with dominant female enrollment, it is vital that institutional leadership more closely match it.”
Also notable
Among the university’s first ladies, most notable were Hattie Mishoe, a nurse by profession who was a driving force in the establishment of a nursing degree program during her husband’s tenure, and Dr. Robin Williams, who was the only first lady in Delaware State history to have a terminal degree and became well-known for her annual First Lady’s Tea events for female graduates and similar tea events for community women during the presidency of Dr. Harry L. Williams.
Many women have distinguished themselves as faculty members throughout the history of Delaware State University, yet none — male or female — have matched the longevity of Dr. Mable Morrison, currently in her 58th year as a music faculty member. Over the last decade, she has also served as the grand marshal during the convocation and commencement events. In 2012, the university presented her an honorary doctorate.
In the most recent “female first,” in January 2020, Dr. Saundra DeLauder, daughter-in-law of former President William B. DeLauder, was the first woman appointed as provost and vice president of academic affairs — second-in-command to the university president.
Dr. Wilma Mishoe, long before her board and university presidential service, lived on campus as a teen in the 1960s during the presidency of her father. She said that throughout the history of Delaware State University, there has always been the presence and influence of strong Black women.
“They were all trailblazers, forging new paths through previously untraveled terrain,” Dr. Mishoe said. She noted Dr. Harriet Ruth Williams, chairwoman of the Chemistry Department, and Dr. Thelma Young, the second female to serve as the board’s vice president. “Without my realizing it at the time, they were both a huge part of that phenomenal ‘village,’ which inspired, guided, molded and helped to prepare me for the place I now occupy in Delaware State University’s history,” Dr. Mishoe said. “The women who have served at DelState rose from numerous adversities, while leading the institution through some of its most difficult times. Yet, with humility and compassion, they were resilient, determined and undefeatable. Their lives and their labors have left an undeniable path for all of us who have followed.”
Carlos Holmes is director of news services and historian for Delaware State University.
