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HISTORY

NOTABLE INTERMENTS

Anna Easter Brown

(Educator)
Anna Easter Brown was born on Easter Sunday, 1879, in West Orange, New Jersey, to George Beverly Brown, a coachman from Virginia, and Lawrie (Laura) Sophia Costeley, of Maryland. She was the sister of Ella Antoinette, Mary Studley, and Beverly Preston Brown.

In 1897, Anna graduated with honors from West Orange High School, and pursued her higher education at the Teacher’s College Department at Howard University, and Columbia University. In 1908, she was one of nine principal founders of Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority (AKA), the first Greek-letter sorority for African American women. Anna served as the organization’s first Treasurer and graduated with four other founders in 1909.

Anna Easter Brown’s first teaching appointment was to the Brick School, in Enfield, North Carolina. During this period, she traveled extensively throughout the United States and developed her life-long interest in African American history. She documented her experiences in articles featured in Opportunity, the magazine of the National Urban League.

In 1926, Anna began her career in education in Rocky Mount at the Lincoln High School, followed by an appointment to Booker T. Washington High School. Although she taught various subjects, including Latin and Social Sciences, she took the greatest interest in teaching African American history to her students, and developed numerous exhibits featuring key aspects of Black history on an annual basis. In addition to her educational initiatives, Brown was a charter member of the YWCA in Rocky Mount, the Chi Omega Chapter of Alpha Kappa Alpha (1925), a resolute member of the Episcopal Church, the American Teachers’ Association, and other civic affairs.

Over the years, Anna Easter Brown served as an advisor and inspiration to countless students, fostering within them their own appreciation and love of history. Later in life, Ms. Brown wrote, “I am not a career woman, but what greater career could one wish there to be as inspiration to her pupils? I have accomplished no great thing but I am steadily working toward a high moral standard and refined womanhood.”

Anna Easter Brown died on March 6, 1957, and rests in Unity Cemetery. In 2008, Alpha Kappa Alpha dedicated a bench at her gravesite, and three years later, a historical marker was erected in her honor at the entrance to Unity Cemetery. In 2016, a historical marker for Anna Easter Brown was unveiled in her native West Orange, New Jersey. In 2017, Ms. Brown was inducted into the Twin County Museum and Hall of Fame.

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