When Nannie Helen Burroughs established the National Association of Wage Earners in the early 20th century, Black women and girls were facing unchecked racism and sexism in the workplace.
They were often relegated to low-paying jobs like sharecropping or domestic service, two occupations in which women suffered harassment, violence and even jail time for the smallest infractions, according to Danielle Phillips-Cunningham, author of "Nannie Helen Burroughs: A Tower of Strength in the Labor World." Burroughs tried to register her organization as an official union under the American Federation of Labor, now known as the AFL-CIO, but its leaders turned her down.
So Burroughs led her own employment agency in Washington, D.C., where she made uniforms for domestic workers and held lectures on women’s rights and issues affecting Black workers across the nation. She had established her own school to educate female students in fields they were barred from, like stenography, and provide them credentials Burroughs hoped would make employers take them more seriously.
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