2010 Black History Month: Sadie Tanner Mossell Alexander-1st Black African American Female PhD

Monday, February 22nd, 2010 @ 1:12 pm | We Think

“…As an active worker for civil rights, she has been a steady and forceful advocate on the national, state, and municipal scene, reminding people everywhere that freedoms are won not only by idealism but by persistence and will over a long time…”
~Excerpt from citation the University Of Pennsylvania honorary degree of Doctor of Laws conferred in 1974 upon Dr. Sadie T.M. Alexander

Sadie Tanner Mossell Alexander, a Philadelphian born in 1898 was a trailblazing female scholar and lawyer. Named Sarah at birth she was known as Sadie throughout her life.

She was born into a family of accomplished individuals. Her maternal grandfather, Benjamin Tucker Tanner, was a bishop in the African Methodist Episcopal (AME) Church. Sadie’s father, Aaron Albert Mossell, was a graduate of Lincoln University and the first African American to graduate from the University of Pennsylvania Law School in 1888. One of her uncles, Nathan Francis Mossell, was the first Black African American physician to graduate from the prestigious University of Pennsylvania. Other members of her family include her uncle the artist Henry O. Tanner and her aunt Hallie Tanner Johnson Dillon who also became a medical doctor and founded the Nurses’ School and Hospital at the Tuskegee Institute- now University, in Alabama.

When Sadie Alexander was to attend high school she was relocated to live with her uncle, Lewis Baxter Moore, the dean of Howard University in Washington , D.C. and the first Black African American to receive a PhD from the University of Pennsylvania.

Upon graduation from the “M” Street high school, the first high school for black students, enrolled, attended and graduated from the University of Pennsylvania School of Education. She then entered the graduate school at Penn to study economics.

In 1921 Sadie T. Mossell became the first Black African American female in the United States to received a doctorate degree as well as the first Black African American to obtain a PhD in economics from the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School of Business. Sadie was proud of her scholastic achievement.

“I can well remember marching down Broad Street from Mercantile Hall to the Academy of Music where there were photographers from all over the world taking my picture.”

Following completion of her graduate work she went to work as an actuary for North Carolina Mutual Life Insurance Company in Durham, North Carolina a black owned and operated insurance company.

In 1923 after her fiance Raymond Pace Alexander was admitted to the Bar and established his law practice Sadie returned to Philadelphia to be married in November of that year.

Autumn of 1924 found Sadie T.M. Alexander a student again at the University of Pennsylvania. This time she was enrolled to study the law.

When she successfully completed her law studies Sadie T.M. Alexander, obtaining an L.L.B., became the first Black African American woman to graduate from the University of Pennsylvania School of Law. During that same year 1927 she was also the first African American woman admitted to the Pennsylvania Bar.

Sadie teamed with her husband to practice law; her particular specialty being estate and family law. Together, Sadie and her husband Raymond they championed removing the barriers of discrimination; they fought to desegregate Philadelphia restaurants, hotels, and theaters.

From 1928 to 1930 and from 1934 to 1938 she was appointed and served as Assistant City Solicitor for the City of Philadelphia.

In 1943 Sadie Alexander was elected the first woman to hold a national office in the National Bar Association.

Four years later Alexander was appointed by President Harry S. Truman to serve on the President’s Committee on Civil Rights. During her appointment the report issued, entitled To Secure These Rights, became the foundation for civil rights policy decisions and legislation implemented in the future.

Finally in 1959 Sadie Alexander opened her own law office where she practiced law for 17 years before joining the firm of Atkinson, Myers and Archie. While practicing law Sadie Alexander found time to be active in more than 30 national and local civic organizations.

1974, Dr. Sadie T.M. Alexander was honored with a fifth degree from the Ivy League University of Pennsylvania. This time she was awarded an honorary Doctor of Laws degree to celebrate and commend her tenacious work for equal public accommodation. When she was eighty-one years old, in 1978 she received another presidential appointment as chair of the White House Conference On Aging.

Sadie Alexander retired from an active practice and public life in 1981. Seven years later, in 1989 she died.

It is very fitting that the Sadie Tanner Mossell Alexander University of Pennsylvania Partnership School, is named for her; it is a public school located in West Philadelphia developed in partnership with the University, which provides academic and financial support to the school.

Every year Black African American law students from the University of Pennsylvania Law school and legal professionals meet at a conference to commemorate Dr. Alexander’s vast scholastic and professional achievements; they gather to honor the many firsts in her career as well as to commend those who are following her academic example in the study of law and outstanding accomplishments in the legal profession.