Myra Lillian Davis Hemmings - Texas Historical Markers on Waymarking.com

Myra Lillian Davis Hemmings knew how to make things happen. She was civic leader by the time she a young adult at Howard University in Washington DC from 1909 to 1913, when she graduated. While at college, Myra D Hemmings joined an existing sorority but felt the women should focus more on the broader social problems they faced and not just those that were college-related. She and a group of other sorority sisters chartered a new sorority, the Delta Sigma Theta before she graduated. Later Mrs. Hemmings help establish a chapter of this same sorority in San Antonio. She was elected President for the first term of the organization.
That was not the only civic activity in which Hemmings was interested and active. She taught English and drama classes in two schools in the San Antonio Independent School District for 51 years! Concurrently, she and her husband, both former actors themselves, established an dramatic acting guild to help teach young black men and women the skills of acting. Her teaching, both in school drama class and in her private acting studio, helped shape and inspire the black community.
In her memory, the resource center for the Delta Sigma Theta sorority was named the Myra Lillian Davis Hemmings Resource Center. The sorority she help found nationally and help charter locally has thrived, reaching over 900 chapters and a quarter million members worldwide. The Myra Davis Hemmigs Resource Center is located at 328 N. Pine Street. The marker is near the intersection of N. Pine Street and E. Crockett Street. It is about two block from part of the San Antonio City Cemetery #3.

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Marker Number: 17358 Marker Text: (August 30, 1895 - December 8, 1968) African American educator, actor, and community activist, Myra Hemmings was born in Gonzales, Texas to Henry and Susan (Dement) Davis. The family moved to San Antonioi, where Myra graduated from Riverside High School in 1909. She attended Howard University in Washington, D.C., where on Jan. 13, 1913 she became one of 22 founders of the Delta Sigma Theta sorority, the primary goals of which were to use their collective strength to promote educational excellence and to provide assistance to those in need. Their first public act was to participate in the Women's Suffrage procession down Pennsylvania Avenue in Washington on Mar. 3, 1913, the day before Woodrow Wilson's presidential inauguration. Hemmings graduated from Howard in May 1913 and returned to begin her teaching career with the San Antonio Independent School District. She taught English and Drama at Frederick Douglass and Phyllis Wheatley High Schools for more than fifty years. Influencing countless students to love performing arts and literature. Memmings organized the San Antonio chapter of Delta Sigma Theta on Aug. 16, 1933 and served as its first president. Today there are more than 950 chapters and more than 250,000 members worldwide. Myra loved the theater and acting. In 1922, she married John (Pop) Hemmings, a former Broadway actor. Together they organized the Phyllis Wheatley dramatic guild players, their productions, in which she often acted, shaped the cultural life of black San Antonians. She directedmre than twenty dramatic plays and appeared i three feature films: "Marching On! (1943), "Go Down, Death!" (1944) and "The Girl In Room 20" (1946). Hemmings received her Master of Arts degree in Drama from Northwestern University in 1947. Myra Hemmings' prolific achievements continue to influence and inspire the community and the world. (2012) Marker is property of the State of Texas

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Date Logged Log   08/19/2015 WayBetterFinder visited it