Rosalyn Terborg-Penn

Rosalyn Terborg-Penn (born October 22, 1941) is an American historian and author. She focuses on early African-American history and African-American women's history. She is a faculty member of Morgan State University.

Early life and education

Rosalyn Marian Terborg-Penn was born in Brooklyn, New York. Her mother was a clerical worker and her father was a jazz musician. In 1951 her family moved to Queens, where she would graduate from John Adams High School in 1959. In 1963 she got a degree in history from Queens College, City University of New York. She moved to Washington, D.C., where she earned her master's degree in United States diplomatic history from the George Washington University. Terborg-Penn then obtained her Ph.D. from Howard University in African-American history before 1865.

Early activism

While at Queens College, she was a founding member of school's NAACP club. She headed a protest on campus when the school would not let Malcolm X speak on campus. She also organized student road trips, including a trip to Prince Edward County in Virginia, where schools were closed by anti-racial integration school officials. While there, Terborg-Penn and other students taught black students. Upon moving to Washington, D.C. to attend The George Washington University, she joined the D.C. Students for Civil Rights group and helped lobby for the Civil Rights Act of 1964.

Career

Terborg-Penn began teaching at Morgan State University in 1969, where she continues to serve as faculty today. She developed the first Ph.D. program at MSU, for history students. She also was a faculty member at the University of Maryland, Baltimore and Howard Community College.

Works

• African American Women in the Struggle for the Vote, 1850-1920. Indiana University Press. 1998. ISBN 0-253-21176-X. 
• Sharon Harley; Rosalyn Terborg-Penn (1997). The Afro-American Woman: Struggles and Images. Black Classic Press. ISBN 978-1-57478-026-0. 
• Terborg-Penn, Rosalyn and Andrea Benton Rushing. Women in Africa and the African Diaspora: A Reader. Washington: Howard University Press (1997). ISBN 0882581945
• Robert L. Harris; Rosalyn Terborg-Penn (13 August 2013). The Columbia Guide to African American History Since 1939. Columbia University Press. pp. 16–. ISBN 978-0-231-51087-5.