Two African-American leaders in the nation’s struggle for justice and civil rights – Sister Mary Antona Ebo and Norman Seay – received honorary doctorates from the University of Missouri–St. Louis during its commencement ceremonies on Saturday.
At the morning ceremony, Sister Ebo, of the Franciscan Sisters of Mary, was given an honorary doctorate of humane letters by Chancellor Tom George.
“I felt honored, and I think the main thing for me is to always remember that I don’t get this on my own – it was my teammates,” Ebo told The American.
“I really actually receive these type of honors for being a Franciscan Sister of Mary and for all the people who have walked with me and prayed with me and helped me along the way.”
Ebo was thrust into the international spotlight in 1965 in Selma, Alabama, when she and six white nuns joined a group of St. Louis clergy who went south to march for voting rights for blacks. Police blocked the group in Selma who were attempting to march to Montgomery from crossing the Edmund Pettus Bridge.
“Years ago, people were not standing up. That’s why we are proud of Sister Ebo because she stood up and stood out upon the Catholic nuns,” said Seay, who received the doctorate of humane letters during the afternoon commencement service. “And we can count the number of priests in the King movement.”
Seay and others helped to integrate public institutions that systematically denied blacks the right of access, service and jobs in the 1950s and 1960s. He said the honor from UMSL came as a surprise, because of his previous activities at the university.
“I was rough and tough,” Seay said as he laughed. “The student body was not at the percentage that I wanted and the faculty wasn’t representative of African Americans. I was surprised that the faculty voted and the curators voted, because [currently] there are no blacks on the board of curators.”
‘I am Negro, a nun’
“I am here because I am a Negro, a nun, a Catholic and because I want to bear witness,” Ebo told the news media that fateful day in Selma. She has been an outspoken advocate for justice and civil rights throughout the nation ever since.
“It was something that needed to be done and it was an opportunity to be there and it was just three days after Bloody Sunday,” Ebo said. “The night that we were preparing, a white minister was beat to death on the streets of Selma.”
Ebo has received numerous honors for her work, with four previous honorary doctorates, including from St. Louis University and Aquinas Institute of Theology.
Ebo has been the subject of a PBS documentary and a Library of Congress exhibition.
She earned two masters degrees and graduated from St. Mary’s Infirmary School of Nursing for Negroes in St. Louis. In 1967, Ebo became the first African-American female executive director of a Catholic U.S. hospital, St. Clare’s Hospital in Baraboo, Wisconsin.
Earlier this year, the UMSL College of Nursing honored Ebo’s career as a health administrator with the Excellence in African American Nursing Award.
CORE to the core
Seay is a founding member of the legendary Congress of Racial Equality (CORE). He spent three months in jail for participating in protests that sought jobs for African Americans in St. Louis banks and financial institutions, the fruit of which he observes today at the bank where he conducts transactions.
“Black cashiers, the manager and assistant manager is black – I go there just to see that,” Seay said. “It’s just a good feeling.”
Previously, Seay served as president of the Federation of Block Units of the Urban League, and he directed the UMSL Office of Equal Opportunity from 1987 to 2000, where Seay started EEO programs for Asians, Native Americans, women and women faculty. The School of Medicine at Washington University St. Louis has a lecture series named in his honor
“The racism today is subtle; it’s sneaky,” Seay said. “They are supposed to treat people fairly and do the right thing, and they sneak off and don’t do the right thing.
