Brenda Ray Moryck Explained

Brenda Ray Moryck
Other Names:Brenda Moryck Francke (after 1930)
Birth Date:13 June 1892
Birth Place:Newark, New Jersey, US
Death Date:[1]
Death Place:Stockbridge, Massachusetts
Occupation:Writer, teacher

Brenda (Estelle) Ray Moryck (1892-1945) was an American writer associated with the Harlem Renaissance.

Early life and education

Brenda Ray Moryck was born in Newark, New Jersey in 1892,[2] [3] the daughter of John W. Moryck and Sarah Rose Ray Moryck. Her father owned a saloon and her mother was an educator and clubwoman.[4] [5] [6] Though Brenda wrote that her great-grandfather was Charles Bennet Ray, her mother's death record gives Adam Ray and Sarah Closson as Brenda's maternal grandparents.[7] [8] [9] Multiple records for Adam Ray state that his father was Adam Ray Sr., not Charles Ray.[10] [11] [12]

William Ashby wrote, "John Moryck [had] a saloon on Academy Street. He lived on Kearney Street. Moryck had an unusual daughter, Brenda. She graduated from Barringer High School, and won a scholarship at Wellsley College, certainly the first Negro girl from Newark to attend a prestigious white school."

Moryck completed a bachelor's degree from Wellesley College in 1916, the only black graduate in her class.[13] She earned a master's degree in English literature from Howard University in 1926.[14] Moryck was a member of Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority Incorporated and was active in the Tau Omega chapter.

Career

Moryck worked for the Newark Bureau of Charities after college, and taught physical culture at a technical school in Bordentown.[15] [16] She taught English and drama at Armstrong Manual Training School in Washington, D.C. during the 1920s.[17] She wrote essays and stories published in The Crisis, Opportunity, and other national periodicals and newspapers.[18] [19] [20] She was also a drama critic for the New York Age,[21] and wrote at least one play, The Christmas Spirit, performed at Armstrong high school in 1927. She was active in the National Urban League, the Harlem YWCA,[22] and the NAACP in New York. She was also an avid golfer.[23]

Moryck's writings are associated with the Harlem Renaissance[24] [25] and have been included in several recent anthologies, among them The new Negro: Readings on race, representation, and African American culture, 1892-1938 (2007), edited by Henry Louis Gates Jr. and Gene Andrew Garrett,[26] Double-take: A revisionist Harlem Renaissance anthology (2001), edited by Venetria K. Patton and Maureen Honey, Harlem's Glory: Black women writing, 1900-1950 (1996), edited by Lorraine Elena Roses and Ruth Elizabeth Randolph,[27] and Speech & power: The African-American essay and its cultural content, from polemics to pulpit (1992). edited by Gerald Early.[28] She had an unpublished novel in manuscript at the time of her death.

Personal life

Moryck married twice. Her first husband was Lucius Lee Jordan; they married in 1917 and he died before their first anniversary. She married Robert Beale Francke in 1930. She had a daughter, Elizabeth (Betty) Osborne Francke,[29] and a foster daughter, Julia Wormley.[30] [31] She died in 1945, in Massachusetts.[32] [33] [34] She had been scheduled to meet up with her daughter who was in boarding school in Albany, New York.

External links

Notes and References

  1. News: Jan 24, 1942 . Mrs. John W Moryck Dies Here In 80th Year; Of Old Family . New York Age .
  2. Web site: New Jersey Births and Christenings, 1660-1980 . FamilySearch.
  3. Web site: Williams. Noelle Lorraine. 2020-09-14. The Incredible Legacy of Newark's Black Women Activists. live. 2021-03-01. Zócalo Public Square. en-US. https://web.archive.org/web/20200922051400/https://www.zocalopublicsquare.org/2020/09/14/black-women-activists-artists-leadership-newark-new-jersey-archival-records/ideas/essay/ . 2020-09-22 .
  4. Book: Ashby, William M. (William Mobile) . Reflections on the Life of Negroes in Newark . 1972-02-16.
  5. News: 1942-01-24. Mrs. John W. Moryck Dies Here in 80th Year; Of Old Family. 4. The New York Age. 2021-03-01. Newspapers.com.
  6. June 1926. Our Prize Winners and What they Say of Themselves. Opportunity. 4. 189.
  7. Web site: "New York, New York City Municipal Deaths, 1795-1949", database, FamilySearch . .
  8. Web site: D-M-1942-0001580 . Historical Vital Records The New York City Municipal Archives.
  9. Book: Roses . Lorraine Elena . Harlem : renaissance and beyond : literary biographies of 100 black women writers, 1900-1945 . Randolph . Ruth Elizabeth . 1990 . Boston, Mass. . G.K. Hall . 978-0-8161-8926-7.
  10. Web site: Adam Ray Jr. . New York, New York City Municipal Deaths, 1795-1949.
  11. Web site: New Jersey, Marriages, 1670-1980 . FamilySearch.
  12. Web site: New Jersey Marriages, 1678-1985 . FamilySearch.
  13. July 1916. Our Graduates. The Crisis. 121.
  14. Web site: February 28, 2020. Wellesley Celebrates the Legacy of Some of Its Earliest Black Students During Black History Month. live. 2021-03-01. Wellesley College. en. https://web.archive.org/web/20200926083650/https://www.wellesley.edu/news/2020/stories/node/173916 . 2020-09-26 .
  15. News: 1917-06-07. Bordentown Industrial. 7. The New York Age. 2021-03-01. Newspapers.com.
  16. News: 1917-06-01. 12 Graduate from Industrial School. 7. Trenton Evening Times. 2021-03-02. Newspapers.com.
  17. News: 1927-03-15. School Orators Reach Semi-Finals. 45. Evening Star. 2021-03-01. Newspapers.com.
  18. Book: "Girl, colored" and other stories : a complete short fiction anthology of African American women writers in the Crisis magazine, 1910-2010. 2011. McFarland & Co. Judith Musser. 978-0-7864-4606-3. Jefferson, N.C.. 630498177.
  19. Book: Opportunity reader : stories, poetry, and essays from the Urban League's Opportunity magazine. 1999. Modern Library. Sondra K. Wilson, National Urban League. 0-375-75379-6. New York. 41889049.
  20. Austin. Addell P.. 1988. The "Opportunity" and "Crisis" Literary Contests, 1924-27. CLA Journal. 32. 2. 235–246. 44322018. 0007-8549.
  21. News: 1931-05-02. Harlem Experimental Theatre Gives 3 Plays. 6. The New York Age. 2021-03-02. Newspapers.com.
  22. News: 1929-03-16. Rabbi Lyons to Speak at Brooklyn Y.W.C.A.. 2. The New York Age. 2021-03-01. Newspapers.com.
  23. Book: McDaniel, Pete. Uneven Lies: The Heroic Story of African-Americans in Golf. 2000. American Golfer. 978-1-888531-36-7. 50. en.
  24. Book: Black women of the Harlem Renaissance era. 2014. Lean'tin L. Bracks, Jessie Carney Smith. 978-0-8108-8543-1. Lanham. 894554745.
  25. Caughie. Pamela L.. September 2012. "The best people": The Making of the Black Bourgeoisie in Writings of the Negro Renaissance. Modernism/Modernity. 20. 3. 519–537. 10.1353/mod.2013.0064. 144761198 .
  26. Book: Gates. Henry Louis. The new Negro: readings on race, representation, and African American culture, 1892-1938. Jarrett. Gene Andrew. 2007. Princeton University Press. Princeton, N.J.. English. 608490813.
  27. Book: Roses. Lorraine Elena. Harlem's glory : Black women writing, 1900-1950. Randolph. Ruth Elizabeth. 1996. Cambridge, Mass. . Harvard University Press. 978-0-674-37269-6.
  28. Book: Speech & power : the African-American essay and its cultural content, from polemics to pulpit. 1992. Hopewell, NJ . Ecco Press. 978-0-88001-264-5.
  29. https://credo.library.umass.edu/view/full/mums312-b094-i417 Letter from Brenda Moryck Francke to W. E. B. Du Bois
  30. News: 1930-04-12. C. C. S. Girls Meet in Staten Island. 2. The New York Age. 2021-03-02. Newspapers.com.
  31. Web site: United States Census, 1930 . FamilySearch.
  32. News: 1945-12-12 . Summer Resident of Stockbridge Dies in Hospital . 24 . The Berkshire County Eagle . 2023-09-23.
  33. Web site: 2020-03-28 . Records of Evergreen Cemetery (by email correspondence to Noelle Lorraine Williams) . 2023-09-23 . Evergreen Cemetery Hillside, New Jersey 07205 . en-US.
  34. News: December 15, 1945 . Brenda M. Francke Noted School Teacher Dies From Pneumonia . 4 . New York Age .

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