By Cathy Saunders

Lighting the Way

Bringing to Light the Story of Alberta Knox

By Cathy Saunders

Coordinator of Lighting the Way: Historic Women of the SouthCoast New Bedford Whaling Museum

One of the great joys of my role as coordinator of the Whaling Museum’s project Lighting the Way: Historic Women of the SouthCoast is collaborating with colleagues to bring to light the experiences and contributions of local women. Alberta Mae Knox Eatmon (1896-1991) is one such figure.

Alberta Knox was a member of an esteemed New Bedford African American family with roots in the antebellum era. Harriet Jacobs (1813-1897) was her forebear, an ardent abolitionist and author, who wrote a famous autobiography, Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl, Written by Herself (Boston, 1861). Alberta’s brothers were very accomplished; one was an Ambassador to Haiti, another a chemist who worked on the atomic bomb, but her own story, until recently, has been overshadowed.

Knox came to the attention of Lighting the Way through our collaboration with the New Bedford Historical Society. Ivy S. MacMahon, who volunteers for both the Historical Society and Lighting the Way, stepped forward to delve into this story. She began researching Knox during the pandemic, starting with online searches through sites like Ancestry. com and the Amistad Research Center. Locally, she explored Spinner Publications, the New Bedford NAACP’s website, and the Whaling Museum’s online

Portrait of Alberta Knox, Bridgewater State Normal School class photo, circa 1920. NBWM, Mss 203, Knox Family Papers, scrapbook.

Researching the history of women of color is becoming easier with the recent public focus on the history of their struggle for equality and with the increased online availability of research data, e.g., church records, maps, and archives.

“Some teachers are born not made,” begins her portrait of Knox on Lighting the Way, and through the profile we learn that Alberta was salutatorian of the New Bedford High School class of 1913, that she studied at Bridgewater Teacher’s College, and subsequently had a teaching career lasting nearly 50 years. She met Boyd B. Eatmon (1898-1997) while teaching at the Manual Training School of Burlington County, New Jersey, and they married in 1936. They lived in Burlington County, raised a family, and Alberta was always civically engaged. She served as president of the New Bedford Branch of the NAACP in the 1920s, corresponding with such notable civil rights leaders as W.E.B. DuBois (1868-1963), and was active in many community organizations in New Jersey where she eventually lived. Ivy concluded that Alberta Knox was “honored and dearly loved.”

This account of bringing Alberta Knox’s story to light could end there. However, not long after we published her profile on www.HistoricWomenSouthCoast.org, Mike Dyer, Curator of Maritime History, contacted me about an “astonishing” scrapbook, “a thing of wonder, lovingly compiled,” all about Alberta Knox. I was thrilled, and my first response was, “How can we make this as accessible as possible to the public?” Scrapbooks in general are wonderful historical records and a treasure to explore. They give us a window into events and biographical information, material culture of the time, and what was valued by the keeper and society at large. Knox collected newspaper clippings, school records, photographs, postcards, letters, and even her 1920 voter registration. Many pages have multiple items that one must unfold or open to read.

My goal was to make this gem available online. First, Mark Procknik, the Museum’s Librarian, officially processed the Knox family papers (Mss 203) and created a finding aid for it. Director of Digital Engagement Michael Lapides, then began the painstaking process of photographing each of these items. He was immediately delayed when he discovered a conservation issue that had to be addressed before he could continue. He sent the book to Director of Collections Jordan Berson, for care, ensuring that the original book is preserved to the best possible standard. At the time of this writing, Lapides is creating a digitized version of the scrapbook. Readers will soon be able to see the entire digitized scrapbook online.

Since its inception in 2018, over 120 women have been profiled on the website of Lighting the Way: Historic Women of the SouthCoast.

Alberta M. Knox voter registration card, New Bedford, MA, August 5, 1920. NBWM, Mss 203, Knox Family Papers.