Marvel Jackson Cooke

            Marvel Jackson Cooke was born in Mankato, Minnesota in 1903 and went to the University of Minnesota. After graduating with a degree in English in 1925, Cooke went to Harlem, New York during the Harlem Renaissance. In Harlem she took a position as an editorial assistant for W.E.B Dubois at the NAACP magazine The Crisis.

             She later moved on to work for The Amsterdam News as the newspaper’s first female reporter. During her time there Cooke organized the first union at an African American-owned newspaper and led a strike that lasted 11 weeks. Cooke then began working as an assistant managing editor for People’s Voice. Eventually she gained recognition and was offered a job at The New York Daily Compass, where she was the first female reporter and the first African American reporter. While writing for The Compass she was praised for her efforts of under-cover reporting of the working conditions of New York City domestic workers.

            In 1953 she decided to leave the journalism world and focus more on political activism. She was elected New York Director of the Council of Arts, Science and Professions. Cooke became a member of the Communist party and was subsequently asked to testify two times in front of the United States Senate’s Subcommittee on Investigations in 1954. The investigations did not change Cooke’s political views and she went on to serve as a national vice chairman for the American-Soviet Friendship Committee for eight years.

            Cooke spent her late years returning to journalism and writing for the New World Review as well as sponsoring political events. Cooke passed away after losing a battle with leukemia in 2000 at the age of 99. Her legacy is remembered through her achievements as the first female and African American reporter at an all-white newspaper and through her political accomplishments.

Source: 

• Minnesota Encyclopedia, Minnesota Historical Society. "Cooke, Marvel Jackson (1901-2000)." Accessed October 22, 2013. http://www.mnopedia.org/person/cooke-marvel-jackson-1901-2000