[et_pb_section fb_built=”1″ _builder_version=”4.16″ custom_padding=”||0px||false|false” global_colors_info=”{}”][et_pb_row admin_label=”Page Header” _builder_version=”4.16″ global_colors_info=”{}”][et_pb_column type=”4_4″ _builder_version=”4.16″ custom_padding=”|||” global_colors_info=”{}” custom_padding__hover=”|||”][et_pb_text admin_label=”Exhibit Title” _builder_version=”4.17.6″ _dynamic_attributes=”content” _module_preset=”default” border_width_bottom=”1px” border_color_bottom=”#E09900″ global_module=”6078″ global_colors_info=”{}”]@ET-DC@eyJkeW5hbWljIjp0cnVlLCJjb250ZW50Ijoic2l0ZV90aXRsZSIsInNldHRpbmdzIjp7ImJlZm9yZSI6IjxoMj4iLCJhZnRlciI6IjwvaDI+In19@[\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text admin_label=”Section Title” module_id=”section-title” module_class=”page-header” _builder_version=”4.16″ custom_margin=”||5px” global_colors_info=”{}”]<\/p>\n
[\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text admin_label=”Page Title” module_id=”page-title” module_class=”page-header” _builder_version=”4.16″ custom_margin=”0px||” global_colors_info=”{}”]<\/p>\n
[\/et_pb_text][\/et_pb_column][\/et_pb_row][et_pb_row column_structure=”3_5,2_5″ _builder_version=”4.16″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”][et_pb_column type=”3_5″ _builder_version=”4.16″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”][et_pb_image src=”https:\/\/oldsite.coloredconventions.org\/black-illinois-organizing\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/43\/2021\/12\/CCP_009_MaryRichardsonJones-1883.jpeg” title_text=”Mary Richardson Jones” show_in_lightbox=”on” _builder_version=”4.16″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”][\/et_pb_image][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.16″ _module_preset=”default” text_font_size=”13px” text_line_height=”1.3em” header_font_size=”13px” custom_margin=”-11px|||||” global_colors_info=”{}”]<\/p>\n
Mary Richardson Jones, circa 1883 [\/et_pb_text][\/et_pb_column][et_pb_column type=”2_5″ _builder_version=”4.16″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.16″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”]<\/p>\n \u2014 Mary Richardson Jones, \u201cCultured Negro Ladies,\u201d <\/span>Chicago Tribune, <\/span><\/i>Oct. 28, 1888.<\/span><\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][\/et_pb_column][\/et_pb_row][et_pb_row column_structure=”3_5,2_5″ _builder_version=”4.16″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”][et_pb_column type=”3_5″ _builder_version=”4.16″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.27.4″ _module_preset=”default” hover_enabled=”0″ global_colors_info=”{}” sticky_enabled=”0″]<\/p>\n Mary Jane Richardson Jones lived eighty-nine years and was a leading figure among Black Chicagoans. During her long life, she was active in abolitionism and women\u2019s rights, and she ultimately became one of the city\u2019s wealthiest and most respected Black women. \u201cIn her own field she made Chicago history,\u201d wrote her granddaughter, Theodora Lee Purnell, in 1955.[1<\/span>]<\/span><\/p>\n Mary was born free in Tennessee in 1820, one of nine children of Diza Morris and Elijah Richardson. Several of the siblings led interesting lives, including Alfred Richardson<\/a><\/span>, a founder of Black Baptist churches in Illinois and delegate to the 1853 Chicago convention.[2<\/span>]<\/span><\/p>\n Mary and her family were living in Memphis, where her father worked as a blacksmith, when she met the young John Jones<\/a><\/span>. The Richardsons moved to Alton, Illinois, in 1837. John Jones soon joined them, and John and Mary married in 1841. Their first child, Lavinia, was born two years later. In 1845 the small family decided to start a new life in Chicago.[3]<\/span><\/p>\n In Chicago, Mary and John sheltered fugitives from slavery in their home and hosted Frederick Douglass when he was in town. Through Douglass they came to know the white radical, John Brown. Years later, Mary recalled having told her husband that she thought Brown, who had planned to provoke a violent revolt against slavery, was \u201ca little off on the slavery question.\u201d Still, she reported, she and her husband opened their doors to Brown as he passed through Chicago. Her granddaughter remembered that Mary \u201cstood guard at the door\u2026 with the slaves huddled below in her basement.\u201d[4]<\/span><\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][\/et_pb_column][et_pb_column type=”2_5″ _builder_version=”4.16″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”][\/et_pb_column][\/et_pb_row][et_pb_row column_structure=”3_5,2_5″ _builder_version=”4.16″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”][et_pb_column type=”3_5″ _builder_version=”4.16″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”][et_pb_image src=”https:\/\/oldsite.coloredconventions.org\/black-illinois-organizing\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/43\/2021\/12\/CCP_131_JonesRegistry-1844.png” title_text=”CCP_131_JonesRegistry-1844″ show_in_lightbox=”on” _builder_version=”4.16″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”][\/et_pb_image][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.16″ _module_preset=”default” text_font_size=”13px” text_line_height=”1.3em” header_font_size=”13px” min_height=”51.7px” custom_margin=”-8px|||||” global_colors_info=”{}”]<\/p>\n Registration of Mary and John Jones, 1844<\/strong> [\/et_pb_text][\/et_pb_column][et_pb_column type=”2_5″ _builder_version=”4.16″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”][\/et_pb_column][\/et_pb_row][et_pb_row column_structure=”3_5,2_5″ _builder_version=”4.16″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”][et_pb_column type=”3_5″ _builder_version=”4.16″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.27.4″ _module_preset=”default” hover_enabled=”0″ global_colors_info=”{}” sticky_enabled=”0″]<\/p>\n During the Civil War, Mary Jones served as president of the Colored Ladies\u2019 Freedmen\u2019s Aid Society of Chicago. In that role, she worked with Sattie Douglas<\/a><\/span> and others to collect money and donations for the families of Black soldiers and to send supplies to freedpeople in the south. Among its many activities, in 1864, the organization hired Mary Ann Shadd Cary \u2014 an editor, abolitionist, and women\u2019s rights advocate \u2014 to work as a traveling fundraiser.[5]<\/span><\/p>\n After the war, in the summer of 1865, Susan B. Anthony came to Chicago and lectured in Quinn Chapel A.M.E. Church. Mary Jones introduced Anthony as someone who did not need \u201cto have her father or brothers starved in Southern prisons, to make her aware of the humanity of the Black man.\u201d The topic of Anthony\u2019s lecture was \u201cUniversal Suffrage.\u201d In it, she argued that women, as well as men, should have the right to vote regardless of race.[6]<\/span><\/p>\n After John Jones died in 1879, Mary remained a prominent part of African American civic life in Chicago. As a result of real estate investments made during John\u2019s lifetime, she was one of the wealthiest Black people in the city. Mary was known as a gracious hostess of events at her home at 43 Ray Street. In the late 1880s she became a leader of the Prudence Crandall Literary Club, which held literary discussions, lectures, and musical performances. The Black writer Fenton Johnson later recalled that from the 1860s to the 1890s, \u201cNegro society in Chicago . . . revolved largely around her. She was a stern dictator, quite austere in her leadership.\u201d[7<\/span>]<\/span><\/p>\n Mary Jones\u2019s significance in Chicago was evident to younger generations of politically engaged Black women, including Fannie Barrier Williams and Ida B. Wells. Williams, for example, was thirty-five years younger than Jones. Yet the two women collaborated to lead the women\u2019s branch of the Prudence Crandall Literary Club. The women\u2019s group focused on challenges facing women and girls and discussed strategies for social reform. \u201cWe want more justice to women,\u201d Jones told a newspaper reporter in 1888, \u201cand more virtue among men.\u201d[8]<\/span><\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][\/et_pb_column][et_pb_column type=”2_5″ _builder_version=”4.16″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”][\/et_pb_column][\/et_pb_row][et_pb_row column_structure=”3_5,2_5″ _builder_version=”4.16″ _module_preset=”default” locked=”off” global_colors_info=”{}”][et_pb_column type=”3_5″ _builder_version=”4.16″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”][et_pb_image src=”https:\/\/oldsite.coloredconventions.org\/black-illinois-organizing\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/43\/2021\/12\/CCP_130_MaryRJones-1865.png” title_text=”CCP_130_MaryRJones-1865″ show_in_lightbox=”on” _builder_version=”4.16″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”][\/et_pb_image][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.16″ _module_preset=”default” text_font_size=”13px” text_line_height=”1.3em” header_font_size=”13px” min_height=”51.7px” custom_margin=”-8px|||||” global_colors_info=”{}”]<\/p>\n
<\/strong>(Source: Image Courtesy of the Chicago History Museum, ICHi-022363<\/a>; Baldwin & Drake, photographer)<\/p>\n“We want more justice to women<\/span>.”<\/h2>\n
In 1844, as required by state law, John and Mary Jones went before the Madison County Clerk to register as free Black people. A white resident had to give a sworn deposition on their behalf. (Source: Slave Emancipation Registry Book #3 1840-1860, Courtesy of Madison County Circuit Clerk Digital Collections<\/a>)<\/p>\n