Rowena Moore

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Rowena Moore (1910 - ?) was the founder of the Malcolm X Memorial Foundation, and was single-handedly responsible for the recognition of the Malcolm X House Site in North Omaha, Nebraska.

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[edit] Biography

Moore was born in 1910 in Meridian, Oklahoma. When her father got a job in meat packing industry, her family moved to Omaha, Nebraska in 1924. In the year 1927, she got married.

During World War II Moore, her husband, and their son lived in an apartment in Omaha. While many women were given jobs in the meat packing industry, African American women such as Moore were routinely discriminated against. Moore organized a union of black women who were committed to securing employment in the meatpacking industry called the Defense Women’s Club.[1] The goal of this union was to promote war bonds and food rationing, child care for working mothers and securing jobs for black women. They wrote letters to the federal Fair Employment Practices Committee, and an official came to Omaha to order the South Omaha packing houses to stop discriminating against black women. Soon after, Moore and some other 400 women were hired. She worked there for twenty years.[2]

Within a short time, Moore became secretary of the meat cutter’s local. In 1948, she became the secretary of the Omaha Metropolitan Labor Council. She is attributed with further challenging discrimination in the 1950s, when the meatpacking plants again moved towards employment discrimination.[3] These actions led to Moore getting fired from the plants; however, she maintained her passion to fight for social justice.

Moore was elected as a chairwoman of the Douglas County Demographic Central Committee in 1971. She was also the first black woman to run for the Omaha City Council. Moore was inspired by listening to Malcolm’s speeches, deciding to start an organization to benefit African Americans.

Moore became the founding president of the Malcolm X Memorial Foundation. Today the Foundation is a cultural and educational institution located in Omaha. The Foundation's lasting contribution to the city of Omaha and the nation is the preservation of the Malcolm X House Site as a Nebraska historical heritage site, with future plans to develop it further.[4]

Late in her life Moore's activism did not cease; rather, it accelerated. In 1989 she nominated the North Omaha Freeway to become the Malcolm X Freeway.[5] She was also responsible for an early 1990s gathering that brought together thousands in Omaha to celebrate Malcolm X's life through the African American Progressive Action Network and the National Malcolm X Commemoration Commission, and inspired the State of Nebraska to place the Malcolm X House Site on the state's historical register.[6]

[edit] Publications about Moore

  • Chapter IV, "I'm Been Ahead of My Time": Rowena Moore and Black Women's Activism in Omaha," pp. 85-99, in Halpern, R. and Horowitz, R. (1999) Meatpackers: An Oral History of Black Packinghouse Workers and Their Struggle for Racial and Economic Equality. New York: Monthly Review Press, 1999.

[edit] See also

[edit] References

  1. ^ Horowitz, R. and Halpern, R. (1999). Work, Race, and Identity: Self-Representation in the Narratives of Black Packinghouse Workers. Oral History Association.
  2. ^ (nd) The West Out Loud: Western Community Collaborative Digitization Program. Retrieved 4/27/07.
  3. ^ Horowitz, R. and Halpern, R. (1999).
  4. ^ (nd) Our Founder. Malcolm X Memorial Foundation] website.
  5. ^ (1989) Letter from the Omaha mayor to Moore rejecting the idea of renaming the North Omaha Freeway.
  6. ^ Fuson, K. "Omaha woman never forgot legacy of malcolm X," Des Moines Register.


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