Embedded Files
Ella Baker in 1941 assisting the NAACP.
Photo courtesy of Afro American Newspapers
Growing up hearing stories of her grandmother of slave revolts and her own story of getting whipped for not marrying the man the plantation master chose for her, Ella developed a sense of resilience and drive to combat social injustice. Ella Baker questioned the status quo and confidently articulated her concerns and suggestions to any authority figure.
While working with Martin Luther King, Baker never received an official leadership position within SCLC and was never treated equally by MLK. When asked about the noticeable distance between MLK and Ella, she notes, ‘‘after all, who was I? I was female, I was old. I didn’t have any Ph.D.’’
Photo courtesy of Danny Lyon / Magnum Photos
"The average attitude toward the southern Baptist ministers at that stage, and maybe still, was as far as their own women were concerned were that they were nice to talk to about such things as how well they cooked, how beautiful they looked, and how well they carried out a program that the minister had delegated them to carry out but not a person with independence and creative ideas of his own, but on whom they had to rely. They could not tolerate, and I can understand that they couldn't, and especially from a person like me because I was not the kind of person that made special effort to be ingratiating. I didn't try to insult but I did not hesitate to be positive about the things with which I agreed or disagreed. I might be quiet but if there was discussion and I was suppose to be able to participate, I participated at the level of my thinking."
(Ella Baker on her relationship with the male ministers of SCLC.)
Excerpt from Oral History Interview with Ella Baker, September 4, 1974.
Interview G-0007. Southern Oral History Program Collection (#4007)
Ella Baker with Ruby Dee speaking at the Jeannette Rankin news conference on January 3, 1968.
Photo courtesy of Jack Harris/AP Images.
The Civil Rights Movement mirrored the Black Baptist church in the making of its organizational structure, women as members running fundraising drives, starting committees to serve the community, and the leadership being exclusively male. The frustration of being taken advantaged by men with large egos, Ella sought inspiration more than ever to mentor young grassroots participants eager to lead the Movement forward.
"[G]roup-centered leadership, rather than toward a leader-centered group pattern of organization, was refreshing indeed to those of the older group who bear the scars of the battle, the frustrations and the disillusionment that come when the prophetic leader turns out to have heavy feet of clay."
Ella Baker, "Bigger than a Hamburger Speech," 1960
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