Tube City Almanac

February 16, 2009

City's Semper Fi Club Still Faithful

Category: News || By

Next Friday, a group of local women will gather at a local restaurant for a meeting in friendship and fellowship that's been held every month for 90 years.

They're part of a tradition that stretches back to 1919, when several "Negro housewives" from the city formed The Semper Fidelis Club to promote education, community leadership and civic improvement.

On Sunday, about two dozen members of Semper Fidelis gathered at McKeesport Heritage Center to discuss the group's origins and continuing legacy. The presentation --- led by current Semper Fidelis President Elaine Richardson and Treasurer Laura Green --- was part of the center's celebration of Black History Month.

"McKeesport occasionally gets a bad rap, but it's organizations like Semper Fidelis that make living and working in McKeesport so enjoyable," said city attorney Terry Farrell, president of the Heritage Center board.

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The name --- Latin for "Always Faithful" --- was suggested by one of the founding members, Janey Garland, mother of well-known McKeesport photographer Percy Garland and mother-in-law of Hazel Garland, former editor of the Pittsburgh Courier.

Did the club borrow the name from the motto of the U.S. Marine Corps? Probably, said one of the longest serving members of Semper Fidelis, past president M. Jeanne Dix.

"But we've been just as faithful as the Marines all this time," said Dix, whose family has been involved with the group since the beginning. Dix's sister, Carrie Ann James, is also a member and past president; their mother and grandmother also were members of Semper Fidelis.

Green, another past president, said the club held its first meeting on Sept. 19, 1919 at the home of founding president Annie Marshall. Its bylaws called for the club to focus on religious, civic, educational and social programs for the city's African-American community. Dues were 15 cents per month.

Membership was limited to 35 people, Green said, "and there was always a waiting list."

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Over the years, Semper Fidelis has raised money for many local causes, including UPMC McKeesport Hospital (where a room is named in the club's honor), Carnegie Library of McKeesport, the clock at the corner of Fifth and Walnut streets, Downtown, and the KaBOOM! playground in the Seventh Ward.

Money is generated through dues, bake sales, dinners and other activities.

Semper Fidelis also "adopts" a family each year, contributing food and clothing vouchers to an anonymous needy family originally chosen by Housing Opportunities and now selected by LaRosa Boys and Girls Club.

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Perhaps its best known activity has been the annual Semper Fidelis scholarship awarded to the top two students of color at McKeesport Area High School. The scholarships were initiated by the late Frances Keith Newman, one of the first female morticians in Allegheny County and a pioneering businesswoman in the city.

The most recent recipients were first-place winner Rebecca Davis, a pre-med student at the University of Pittsburgh at Greensburg, and second-place winner Gary Bush, a freshman at Hampton University in Virginia.

Past winners have included Bucks County Judge Clyde Waite and former state Supreme Court Justice Cynthia Baldwin; and the late Phyllis Garland, a New York magazine editor and Columbia University journalism professor.

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A review of the club's activities from the 1950s through the 1970s reflects the civil rights struggles of the times. For years, Semper Fidelis sponsored an annual "race relations" or "human relations" tea.

Green pointed out items in the club's newsletters that noted the Daily News was finally going to move Semper Fidelis functions to the "Society" page with other (that is, "white") social clubs instead of segregating them by themselves. In 1957, the club sent a telegram to President Eisenhower, thanking him for sending in the 101st Airborne Division to desegregate Central High School in Little Rock, Ark.

Semper Fidelis' early members were "black women of courage, vision and faith," Green said, "interested in improving themselves and improving the community."

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These days, one of the club's biggest struggles is coping with the declining and aging population of the Mon-Yough area, and the lack of interest among younger women in joining social clubs.

"Many of us are kind of 'warriors' and have been out there for years, trying to get some new, fresh blood and new, fresh ideas into our organization," said Norine Jenkins, who chairs the membership committee.

Prospective members of Semper Fidelis must be invited to join the club. Sometimes they decline, Jenkins said, but most recognize that an invitation to join one of the city's oldest civic groups is an honor.

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One of the program's highlights was the singing of Sherry Johnson of Trinity Church of God in Christ, Jenny Lind Street, who led the audience in "Lift Ev'ry Voice and Sing."

At the end of the afternoon, Johnson closed the program with a solo performance of "Great is Our Faithfulness" --- a last-minute change. She selected the song, she said, to reflect the group's name and mission.

On Thursday, Semper Fidelis will be one of five local charities that will receive a donation from the Mon Valley Inaugural Ball Committee, which last month held a dinner dance at Youghiogheny Country Club, Elizabeth Township, to mark the swearing-in of President Obama. A 90th anniversary banquet is slated for October, club officials said.

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Disclaimer: The author is a member of the board of directors of McKeesport Heritage Center.






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