Amy Jacques Garvey - Biography

Biography

Amy Jacques Garvey was a pioneering journalist and activist. She came to New York in 1917 and soon after became involved with publishing of The Negro World newspaper in Harlem from its inception in August 1918.

She became the second wife of Negro World publisher, Pan-Africanist and UNIA-ACL President General Marcus Garvey when they married on 27 July 1922. Ironically, she had been Amy Ashwood's bridesmaid on 25 December 1919 at Marcus Garvey's first wedding, which broke down very quickly. She and Garvey had two sons, Marcus Jr. and Julius.

During her tenure from 1924 to 1927 as a Negro World associate editor, she added a page called "Our Women and What They Think". She was primarily responsible for the publication in the 1920s of both volumes of the Philosophy & Opinions of Marcus Garvey. After her husband's death in 1940, she became a contributing editor to a journal, the African, published in Harlem in the 1940s. After Marcus Garvey's death, she persevered, writing countless articles and letters.

In November 1963, Amy Jacques Garvey visited Nigeria as a guest of Dr. Nnamdi Azikiwe who was being installed as that nation's first Governor-General. She published her own book, Garvey and Garveyism in 1963, as well as a booklet, Black Power in America: The Power of the Human Spirit in 1968. Her final work was the Philosophy and Opinions of Marcus Garvey volume III, written in conjunction with E.U. Essien-Udom.

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