Alexandria Russell is Executive Director of the Boston Women's Heritage Trail.

“I was fully captivated by this story about women’s efforts to tell their own history. Russell’s engaging narrative reminds readers that public commemorations of Black women’s history are a product of Black women’s history itself--a history of labor, fundraising, intellectual work, and local politics.”--Lynn M. Hudson, author of West of Jim Crow: The Fight Against California's Color Line

• Acknowledgments Introduction. Part One. Creating Their Own World: Named Memorials of African American Women during Jim Crow Chapter 1. The Phillis Wheatley Brand Chapter 2. Commemorating Freedom: Named Memorials of Sojourner Truth and Harriet Tubman Chapter 3. The Three Marys: Living Named Memorials of African American Women Chapter 4. Claiming Public Space: The Landscape of Named Memorials Part Two. The National, State, and Local Stages: Ushering in the Golden Age of African American Women’s Memorialization Chapter 5. Mary McLeod Bethune and a New Era of Commemoration Chapter 6. From Murdering Voodoo Madame to the Mother of Civil Rights Chapter 7. The Madam Walker Theatre: From Urban Life to Legacy Center Chapter 8. The Charlotte Hawkins Brown Site: State-Funded Memorialization Chapter 9. Celia Mann, Modjeska Simkins, and Historic Columbia: Re-imagining House Museums in the Twenty-First Century Conclusion Notes Bibliography Index