"Gertrude Mossell Bustill" (July 3 1855- Jnuary 21 1948)

Gertrude  Bustill Mossell in Philadelphia,Pennsylvania. Her parents, Charles H. and Emily (Robinson) Bustill,were among the free-black elite of nineteenth-century Philadelphia.The prominent Bustill family included generations of achievers, including Mosell's great-grandfather,the former slave Cyril Bustill (1732-1806),who earned his freedom and served on George Washington's staff as a baker during the American Revolution.One of Cyril's daughters Grace Bustill Douglass (1782-1842),was an abolitionist and a member and officer of the Philadelphia Female Anti-Slavery Society, as was her daughter,Sarah Mapps Douglass (1806-1882),who also married a Douglass.Sarah was not only an abolitionist but a feminist and noted educator.Perhaps the most illustrious member of the Bustill family was her cousin, Paul Bustill Robeson (1898-1976),who became a Rhodes scholar after graduating from Rutgers University and went on to become a prominent actor, singer, and political activist.Gertrude and her elder sister, who later became Mrs. William D. Robertson,were raised as Quakers,as were many of the Bustills. Both women later followed the lead of several family members and joined the Presbyterian church.They were educated in Philadelphia "Colored" schools.After completing Roberts Vaux Grammar School, Gertrude Bustill taught school for seven years at various places, including Camden,New Jersey,and Frankford, Delaware.As was the custom, her marriage to physician Nathan F. Mossell of Lockport, Pennsylvania,probably in the early 1880s, ended her formal teaching career. She returned to live in Philadelphia. Where she reared two daughters, Mazie and Florence. A few years after her marriage, Gertrude resumed her writing and developed a career as a journalist,educating the public about women's rights and social reform movements.Her career goal emerged from her exceptional ability as a writer who came from a family of political activists and feminists. The Rev, Benjamin Tucker Tanner discovered Gertrude writing potential, probably in the 1860s,when he was a guest at the closing exercise of the Robert Vaux Grammar School, where he heard her read her essay "Influence."He invited her to submit it for publication to the periodical he edited, the Christian Recorder.As a result of this first literary success,she began an outstanding literary career,writing essays and columns for numerous newspapers and periodicals and eventually writing two books, The Work of the Afro-American Woman (1894) and Little Dansie's One Day at Sabbath School (1902).Gertrude developed a national reputation as a journalist writing for African American newspapers.Her articles and columns appeared in the AME Church Review,the (New York) Freeman, and the (Indianapolis_ World. In Philadelphia,she wrote for leading papers, with syndicated columns in the Echo, the Philadelphia Times,the Independent,and the Press Republican.In addition, Gertrude assisted in editing the Lincoln Alumni Magazine, the journal of her husband's alma mater.African American women journalist were few and far between during the 1880s when Gertrude wrote the column "Our Woman's Department,"which appeared in the first issue of T. Thomas Fortune's New York Freeman,in December 1885.She introduce her column by titling the first one "Women Suffrage."Gertrude wrote that her column would "be devoted to the interest of women" and that she would "promote true womanhood,especially that of the African race."She encouraged readers ignorant about the issues of women suffrage to read books and periodicals to educate those who thought unfavorably about votes for women would be convinced to change their opinions.Married women, Gertrude argued, supported women suffrage. Her word indicated a significant political awareness and sophistication shared by only a few outspoken black women suffragists in the 1880s.Gertrude column appeared every other week throughout 1886, in it she promoted career development in business and the professions. She called for the training of women in skills that would prepared them for businesses, such as the restaurant industry.As for literary and journaklistic careers, Gertrude introduced her readers to Josephine Turpin, and Charlotte Ray;to such essayists as Mary Ann Shadd Cary;and to such journalists as Ida B.Wells-Barnett,Clarissa Thompson, and Mattie Horton, using her column to promote women and to encourage them to seek their rights. Gertrude died at the age of ninety-two at Frederick Douglass Memorial Hospital in Philadelphia.