Sarah Meriwether Nutter - Career and Later Life

Career and Later Life

After graduation, Sarah Meriwether did additional study at Miner Teacher's College. By 1915 she worked as an English teacher at Baltimore's Teacher Training School.

Later Meriwether taught at both Howard University and Washington, D.C.'s Dunbar High School, an academic high school that attracted outstanding teachers. Because the District was run as part of the Federal government, African American teachers in the public schools were paid on the same scale as whites. The Dunbar High School was the academic high school for African Americans and had very high standards.

In 1920, Meriwether moved to Charleston, West Virginia, where she met and married T. Gillis Nutter, an attorney. In Charleston, Sarah Nutter was on the Education and Program Committees of the NAACP, organized the Kanawha County's College Alumni Club, and was a member of Charleston's Book Lovers Club. She was the first African-American to join the Virginia Society for Crippled Children.

Nutter arranged for donation to Howard University of the table where Gen. Oliver O. Howard signed the charter that created the college. She established Alpha Kappa Alpha chapters, such as Nu Chapter at West Virginia University in 1922. Nutter was one of the charter member of Beta Beta Omega in Charleston. Nutter died on May 10, 1950.