Gorée Island Reflections: Honoring My Grandmother’s Legacy
I just finished celebrated author Ta-Nehisi Coate’s latest book, The Message. A major theme of the book is about the power of journalists and writers to help realize justice globally by countering one-sided narratives and amplifying the stories of marginalized people and places. This is why I share family stories.
The book is built on Coate’s travel experiences. Chapter Two, On Pharaohs, about his trip to Dakar Senegal and the Island of Gorée (The House of Slaves) was my favorite, evoking cherished memories of my birthday trip to Senegal with family and dear friends. The trip was years in the making, as I’d always wanted to take my children to West Africa.
A Journey to Gorée Island
On Gorée, we held a ceremony sharing memories and photos of our American and Caribbean ancestors as a tribute, and to take them back to the place where their African ancestors were once held captive before enduring the terror of the middle passage and slavery. I remember clutching a photo of my paternal grandmother Laura Henderson Kearns (1917–2013) on that day.
My fondest memories of her were as a loving, dynamic woman of deep faith who enjoyed taking care of her family while humming church hymns. She was an excellent cook known for brewing delicious sun tea on her back porch using mint leaves from her garden. Throughout her life she was deeply committed to her family, education, and the church — noble dedications born from a very difficult upbringing.
Ancestral Strength & Family
Her life story was made possible by strong women who persevered through deep hardship. Her grandmother, Emma Goodwin, was born in Columbia, South Carolina, in 1866, just a year after the end of slavery. At the young age of 14, she was listed as a house servant for John Bell in the 1880 US Census for Charlotte, likely having traveled the 90 miles from Columbia to Charlotte by herself to start a new life. She married, had five children and supported them doing backbreaking work as a washerwoman.
My grandmother was born Laura Lee Henderson on August 3, 1917, in Mecklenburg County, North Carolina. She was the seventh of nine children born to Harvey Henderson (son of Emma Goodwin) and Ida Owens of Charlotte. Laura eight siblings were: James “Tub,” Lucille “Ceele,” Isabella, Howard “Brother,” Margaret “Dood,” a brother who died in infancy, Alice, and Francis.
Early Struggles & Community Support
Tragedy struck when Laura was just nine years old; her father Harvey passed away suddenly, leaving Ida to support eight children on her own. This circumstance coupled with the Great Depression forced Laura and her siblings to start working at an early age to help provide food and shelter for the family. They worked tirelessly with their mother, scrubbing floors, cleaning bathrooms, washing windows, and doing laundry and ironing for various affluent white families in Charlotte, including the Nesbitts, the McLaskies, Mrs. Elizabeth Wright and her mother Phyllis, Lorraine, and Mrs. Laura Austin, among others.
Remarkably, her mother, Ida, was a graduate of Scotia Seminary (now Barber-Scotia College in Concord, North Carolina), extending our family’s HBCU legacy back 124 years. Ida married Harvey during or right after college and started raising a family. When Harvey died suddenly, she found herself without a clear path to utilize her education. With few options available, she felt no choice but to resort to domestic work to support her family.
Seventh Street Presbyterian Church (now First United Presbyterian in Charlotte) was Ida’s source of support through life’s challenges. She was a Deaconess at a time when women were not ordained to any office in the church; she served as president of the church women, organizing them into fellowships called “circles”. Ida also taught Sunday School and raised her family within the church community, which included college-educated Black professionals. These church members provided her children, who were educated in Charlotte’s segregated public schools, with encouragement and aspiration to attend college. One Seventh Street church elder — Napoleon Chisolm — encouraged my grandmother Laura to follow in her mother’s footsteps and attend Scotia.
From Determined Student to Pioneering Teacher
Coming from a relatively poor background, my grandmother had to perform grueling work while at Scotia, including cleaning university kitchens and bathrooms, to fund her education. Feeling exploited and exhausted by these circumstances, she left Scotia vowing that if she ever had children, she would ensure that they would be spared similar hardships. She enrolled at Johnson C. Smith University in Charlotte as a day student and graduated with a goal of becoming an educator.
Laura pursued further education in early childhood education at the University of Virginia and Johns Hopkins University. Over the next three decades, she served as public-school teacher, notably pioneering HeadStart and Kindergarten programs at Gainsboro School in Roanoke, Virginia. Her exceptional contributions earned her national recognition as Outstanding Teacher of the Year in 1975. Throughout her life, she was also deeply committed to the Presbyterian Church, serving as an elder, Synod president, and a member of Las Americas Unidas. This group, consisting of 61 women from across the United States, traveled to countries including Brazil, Costa Rica, Cuba, the Dominican Republic, Guatemala, and Panama to engage in dialogue with Latin American women. As a wife and mother, she fulfilled her promise to her three children, who attended Johnson C Smith and Knoxville College without the burden of work-study programs, ultimately becoming a minister and two educators.
Education and Equity
Reflecting on her educational journey and commitment to educating others, I can’t help but think my grandmother would find aspects of higher education troubling. Her own life journey underscored the importance of public education, college affordability, and the vital role of HBCUs.
Today Head Start remains in operation, but a recent report found increasingly inequitable access to it — it enrolls just 30% of children in poverty. Public schools in low-income neighborhoods remain chronically under-resourced. Federal and State governments must be committed to growing Head Start among the economically challenged American families for which it was originally created, and ensuring public schools are equitably resourced.
With respect to college affordability, studies show that after adjusting for inflation, college tuition has increased 197.4% since 1963. Institutions of higher learning must commit themselves to be as financially accessible to as many students as possible. Our richest colleges must commit to resourcing need-blind enrollment. For all other institutions, it’s about prioritizing accessibility and avoiding cost bloat.
HBCUs are the model here. They have consistently managed tuition costs, are under-resourced relative to Predominantly White Institutions, yet consistently produce more with less. Despite representing only 3% of U.S. colleges and typically operating with half the endowment size of PWIs, HBCUs graduate 50% of Black lawyers, 80% of Black judges, 40% of Black engineers, and 50% of Black public-school teachers — like my grandmother. Ironically due to resource challenges, Barber-Scotia is currently unaccredited, with the college’s leadership working to regain accreditation by 2026. We must resource our HBCUs.
Throughout her life, my grandmother impacted many lives through her dedication to her faith and education. She nurtured a family that’s chosen to follow her footsteps into a life of service. Her travels have inspired my own desire to explore the world. Yet, despite her extensive journeys, she never had the chance to visit West Africa. I’m grateful that I was able to take her there and share the story of her amazing legacy with the ancestors.
