{"id":4451,"date":"2024-01-11T16:17:08","date_gmt":"2024-01-11T16:17:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/oldsite.coloredconventions.org\/harper\/?page_id=4451"},"modified":"2025-04-09T23:14:10","modified_gmt":"2025-04-09T23:14:10","slug":"barbara-ann-steward","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/oldsite.coloredconventions.org\/harper\/activist-and-writing-community\/barbara-ann-steward\/","title":{"rendered":"Barbara Ann Steward"},"content":{"rendered":"

[et_pb_section fb_built=”1″ _builder_version=”4.20.0″ _module_preset=”default” locked=”off” global_colors_info=”{}”][et_pb_row _builder_version=”4.20.0″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”][et_pb_column type=”4_4″ _builder_version=”4.20.0″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”][et_pb_text admin_label=”Title” _builder_version=”4.27.0″ _module_preset=”default” header_text_color=”#00457A” global_colors_info=”{}”]<\/p>\n

HARPER AT 200<\/h3>\n

BARBARA ANN STEWARD<\/h1>\n

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Advocating for industrial education, Barbara Ann Steward (also spelled Stewart) was a strong political voice during the 1850s. Born around 1836 in Canada, Steward was the daughter of anti-slavery activists Austin Steward and Patience Steward. Steward was formally educated and began her activism at the young age of seventeen as the secretary for the 1853 Colored Convention held in Geneva, New York, where her father acted as president. She spoke at the convention and was commended.<\/span><\/p>\n

Evidence suggests that Steward was active in the creation of the Western New York auxiliary to the National Council of Colored People.[1] Steward\u2019s visibility escalated in 1855 with a published letter to Frederick Douglass that stressed the need for an industrial college. Steward believed that education as \u201ca mere knowledge of books, without a trade of some kind is useless, as the colored people are situated now.\u201d Finding a lack of understanding about the purpose of industrial colleges, Steward wrote this letter to rectify others\u2019 misconceptions.[2] As Samantha de Vera writes, \u201cSteward challenged Black male leaders\u2019 ideas and accused them of being out of touch with the less privileged and the abysmal state of Black education. She, in order words, tested Black leaders\u2019 acceptance of women\u2019s forceful presence in the political sphere. Steward\u2019s defiance of male leadership would inform the 1855 Troy convention delegates\u2019 decision to deny her delegacy.\u201d[3] At the Colored Convention held in Troy, New York, Steward attended only to have her name \u201cstricken out from the roll\u201d because \u201cs<\/span>everal gentlemen objecting to it on the ground that this is not a Woman’s Rights Convention.<\/span>\u201d[4] Steward\u2019s struggle for active inclusion in the Colored Conventions movement was not unique. Mary Ann Shadd Cary would later confront a similar problem, as delegates assumed that Black women\u2019s concerns were limited to women\u2019s rights. They thus diminished their activism as one sided, ignoring how Black women saw the importance and urgency of addressing both sexism <\/span>and<\/span><\/i> racism.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

In 1855, Steward lectured throughout upstate New York. Addressing the meeting of Colored Citizens in Rochester, Steward delivered a speech focusing on the \u201cThe Rights and Wrongs of her suffering people,\u201d that garnered her an invitation to speak again.[5] Steward also helped represent a freedom seeker in western New York, for which she received public praise.[6] Steward remained a prominent figure in the late 1850s as she joined the public celebration of the British emancipation, reading the Act of Emancipation, which was followed by addresses from Fredrick Douglass and Henry Highland Garnet.[7] Sadly, Barbara Steward passed away from typhoid in December 1861.[8] Steward\u2019s efforts to carve a place for herself in activist circles constituted a feminist thread that connects her other Black women in the Colored Conventions movement.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

REFERENCES<\/span><\/h3>\n

[1] \u201cConvention at Geneva,\u201d <\/span>Frederick Douglass\u2019 Paper,<\/span><\/i> 16 December 1853.<\/span><\/p>\n

[2] \u201cThe Industrial School,\u201d <\/span>Frederick Douglass\u2019 Paper,<\/span><\/i> 1 June 1855.<\/span><\/p>\n

[3] de Vera, Samantha. \u201cBlack Women in Antebellum Colored Conventions.\u201d Ending Slavery: The Antislavery Struggle in Perspective<\/em>, edited by Lawrence Aje and Claudine Raynaud, Presses Universitaires de la M\u00e9diterran\u00e9e, 2022, pp. 61\u201381.<\/p>\n

[4] <\/span>Colored Men’s State Convention of New York (1855 : Troy, NY), \u201cColored Men’s State Convention of New York, Troy, September 4, 1855.,\u201d <\/span>Colored Conventions Project Digital Records<\/span><\/i>, accessed February 22, 2023, <\/span>https:\/\/omeka.coloredconventions.org\/items\/show\/238<\/span><\/a>.<\/span><\/p>\n

[5] \u201cMeeting of Colored Citizens in Rochester,\u201d Frederick Douglass\u2019 Paper, 21 September 1855.<\/span><\/p>\n

[6] \u201cA New Advocate,\u201d <\/span>Frederick Douglass\u2019 Paper,<\/span><\/i> 19 October 1855.<\/span><\/p>\n

[7] \u201cGreat State Celebration,\u201d <\/span>The Liberator<\/span><\/i>, 31 July 1857.<\/span><\/p>\n

[8] C. Peter Ripley, ed., <\/span>The Black Abolitionist Papers<\/span><\/i>, vol. 1 (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1985), 64.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/h3>\n

CREDITS<\/span><\/h3>\n

Written by Rosa Pleasant, History 213 taught by Sharla Fett, Occidental College, Spring\u00a0<\/span>2016. <\/span>Revised by Samantha de Vera. <\/span>Edited by Simone Austin, University of Delaware.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

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