Leila Amos Pendleton

Who is Leila Amos Pendleton?

Lelia Amos Pendleton was born in 1860 in Washington, DC. The date of her death is not known for certain. Pendleton was an African-American community activist and a teacher in Washington’s public schools. She was the founder and president of the Alpha Charity Club of Anacostia and the Social Purity Club of Washington, DC. She was also active in several other women’s race organizations, both as a secretary and vice president. Pendleton was a strong influence in her community. As a community activist, she dedicated herself to the improvement of African Americans through children’s education. Based on her personal experiences as an educator and activist, she wrote A Narrative of the Negro, published in 1912. She considered this book, which offers a comprehensive and readable history of blacks in Africa, the Caribbean, and the United States, to be one of her most noteworthy accomplishments. She describes the book in the preface as a “sort of ‘family story’ to the colored children of America.” The primary audience for her book was African-American schoolchildren, a group that was largely unschooled about the accomplishments of African people and their descendants.