Mary P. Burrill

Mary P. Burrill (August 1881 – March 13, 1946) was an early 20th-century African-American female playwright of the Harlem Renaissance, who inspired Willis Richardson and other students to write plays. Burrill herself wrote plays about the Black Experience, their literary and cultural activities, and the Black Elite. She featured the kind of central figures as were prominent in the black society of Washington D.C., and others who contributed to black women’s education in early twentieth century.

Mary P. Burrill
BornMary Powell Burrill
(1881-08-00)August , 1881
Washington, D.C., USA
DiedMarch 13, 1946(1946-03-13) (aged 64)
New York, USA
OccupationPlaywright, educator
NationalityUnited States
Alma materEmerson College
GenreDrama
Notable worksThey That Sit in Darkness (1919)
Aftermath (1919)
PartnerLucy Diggs Slowe[1]
RelativesClara E. Burrill(Mother), John H. (Father)

Early life

Mary Powell Burrill was born in August 1881 in Washington, D.C., the daughter of John H. and Clara E. Burrill.[2][3] In 1901, she graduated from M Street High School (later Dunbar High School) in Washington, D.C, which was one of the leading black academic, secondary schools in the country at the time. During Burrill's adolescence and early adulthood, she had an emotional and possibly erotic relationship with Angelina Weld Grimké, who would later become a famous poet, playwright and teacher.[4]

Burrill's family later moved to Boston, Massachusetts. There she attended Emerson College of Oratory (later Emerson College), where she received a diploma in 1904.[5]

Career

After graduation, Burrill returned to Washington, DC. From 1905 until her retirement in 1944, she taught English, history, and drama at Dunbar High School, her alma mater, and Armstrong High. [6] For thirty-eight years, Burrill also directed plays and musical productions at Dunbar and throughout Washington, D.C.[7]

Some of Burrill’s students became educators and writers who were actively involved in the Harlem Renaissance. Among these was Willis Richardson, the first African-American dramatist to have a play produced on Broadway in New York City. Another notable student was May Miller, who published her first play, Pandora's Box, while she was still a student at Dunbar.[5]

In 1919, two of Burrill’s most well-known plays were published. They That Sit in Darkness was published in Margaret Sanger's progressive Birth Control Review, a monthly publication advocating reproductive rights for women. The other play, Aftermath, was published in The Liberator], edited by socialist Max Eastman.[3][5] Burrill’s plays were considered protest plays because they advocated progressive stances on issues of race and gender.[8][6] Burrill hosted literary gatherings in her home, which was known as “the Half-Way House.” It served as a meeting space for creative expression and intellectual discussions among many prominent writers and artists of the Harlem Renaissance. [9]For example, she was a friend of Jean Toomer, who had ties in Washington, and Georgia Douglas Johnson.

They That Sit in Darkness

This one-act play written in 1919 focuses on the difficulties faced by working-class black families with numerous children. Malinda Jasper, a 38-year old woman, works full-time and also takes care of her 10 children, her husband never sees their children because they are asleep when he gets home from his job. She dies of physical and mental exhaustion, forcing her 17 year-old daughter to take care of the family rather than go to college as she planned, a result that continues the cycle of poverty for her and her siblings.[10][11][12] Through Malinda’s story, the play explores how legal restrictions that limited women’s access to reproductive rights affected their welfare and that of their families. It was part of a campaign to legalize birth control, but this did not become legal until March 22 1972.[13] Burrill’s work was controversial because it advocated birth control as a means to escape poverty long before women were given reproductive rights in the U.S.[3] [14]

Aftermath

This play is set in rural South Carolina and features John, an African-American soldier who discovers after returning home from World War I that his father has been lynched.[15] The play was produced by New York City's Krigwa Players in 1928.[3][16] John had been awarded the French War Cross for single-handedly fighting off twenty german soldiers, and so saving the lives of everyone in his company.[12] Aftermath (1919) was considered political because Burrill’s portrayed John as a black male who selflessly and fearlessly confronted racial oppression.[17]

Personal life

In 1912, while teaching, Burrill met Lucy Diggs Slowe, an English teacher from Baltimore. After a few years, Slowe moved to DC to teach at Armstrong Manual Training Academy. She and Burrill bought a house together.[18] Burrill was attracted to others of the same gender, at a time when this was discouraged. She sought to prevent her orientation from affecting her social positions, and her acceptance in African-American society.[19] Slowe and Burrill were together for twenty-five years, and their close friends, who were mostly other black female educators, treated them as a couple.

Slowe was appointed in 1922 as Dean of Women at Howard University, a historically black college; she was the first black dean of women there or at any American university. She and Burrill decided to buy a house at 1256 Kearney Street in nearby Brookland, then a predominantly white middle-class neighborhood in Northeast Washington. They lived there for fifteen years until Slowe died in 1937 from kidney disease.[19]

Death and legacy

Shattered from the death of Slowe, Burrill moved out of their house and into an apartment near Howard. She retired from Dunbar High School in 1944. Upon her retirement from teaching in 1944, Burrill moved to New York City, where she died on March 13, 1946 in her early 60s.[20][5] She is buried at Woodlawn Cemetery in Washington, D.C.[21]

The Slowe-Burrill House was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 2020.[22]

References
  1. "Slowe, Lucy Diggs (1885–1937)". Encyclopedia.com. 2002. Retrieved March 10, 2018. During the last 15 years of Slowe's life, Mary Burrill , a recognized Washington, D.C., public school teacher and playwright, was her partner and housemate.
  2. "Twelfth Census of the United States (1900) [database on-line], Washington, District of Columbia, Enumeration District: 45, Page: 15B, Lines: 73-76, household of John H. Burrill". United States: The Generations Network. 1900-06-16. Retrieved 2009-11-27.
  3. West, Sandra L. "Mary Powell Burrill 1884?-1946 on North American Women's Drama website". United States: Alexander Street Press. Retrieved 2009-11-27.
  4. "Biographical Sketch of Mary P. Burrill | Alexander Street, a ProQuest Company". search.alexanderstreet.com. Retrieved 2019-05-06.
  5. Perkins (Ed.), Kathy A. (1990). Black Female Playwrights: An Anthology of Plays Before 1950 (First Midland Book ed.). Bloomington & Indianapolis, Indiana: Indiana University Press. pp. 53–56. ISBN 978-0-253-34358-1.CS1 maint: extra text: authors list (link)
  6. "Angelina Weld Grimké, Mary T. Burrill, Georgia Douglas Johnson, and Marita O. Bonner: An Analysis of Their Plays - ProQuest". search.proquest.com. Retrieved 2019-05-06.
  7. "History of Gay Life in Washington D.C."
  8. Hebel, Udo (1996). "Early African American Women Playwrights (1916-1930) and the Remapping of Twentieth-Century American Drama". AAA: Arbeiten aus Anglistik und Amerikanistik. 21 (2): 267–286.
  9. https://public.ebookcentral.proquest.com/choice/publicfullrecord.aspx?p=492163&query=%22mary+p+burrill%22. Missing or empty |title= (help)
  10. Hebel, Udo J. (1996). "Early African American Women Playwrights (1916-1930) and the Remapping of Twentieth-Century American Drama". AAA: Arbeiten aus Anglistik und Amerikanistik. 21 (2): 267–286. ISSN 0171-5410. JSTOR 43025507.
  11. Perkins (Ed.), Kathy A. (1990). Black Female Playwrights: An Anthology of Plays Before 1950 (First Midland Book ed.). Bloomington & Indianapolis, Indiana: Indiana University Press. pp. 67–74. ISBN 978-0-253-34358-1.CS1 maint: extra text: authors list (link)
  12. Brown-Guillory, Elizabeth (1988). Their Place on the Stage: Black Women Playwrights in America. New York City, New York: Greenwood Press. ISBN 9780313259852 – via Internet Archive.
  13. "Eisenstadt v. Baird, 405 U.S. 438 (1972)", Justia, 2019-03-23, retrieved 2020-02-29
  14. Hebel, Udo (1996). "Early African American Women Playwrights (1916-1930) and the Remapping of Twentieth-Century American Drama". AAA: Arbeiten aus Anglistik und Amerikanistik. 21 (2): 267–286.
  15. Marsh-Lockett, Carol P. (2015-12-22). Black Women Playwrights: Visions on the American Stage. Routledge. ISBN 9781317944942.
  16. Perkins (Ed.), Kathy A. (1990). Black Female Playwrights: An Anthology of Plays Before 1950 (First Midland Book ed.). Bloomington & Indianapolis, Indiana: Indiana University Press. pp. 75–?. ISBN 978-0-253-34358-1.CS1 maint: extra text: authors list (link)
  17. Harris, Will (1994). "Early Black Women Playwrights and the Dual Liberation Motif". African American Review. 28 (2): 205–221. doi:10.2307/3041994. JSTOR 3041994.
  18. "Biographical Sketch of Mary P. Burrill | Alexander Street, a ProQuest Company". search.alexanderstreet.com. Retrieved 2019-05-06.
  19. "History of Gay Life in Washington D.C."
  20. "Biographical Sketch of Mary P. Burrill | Alexander Street, a ProQuest Company". search.alexanderstreet.com. Retrieved 2019-05-06.
  21. "Miss Mary Burrill Dies". The Evening Star. March 15, 1946. p. 9.
  22. "Weekly List 20201009". National Register of Historic Places (U.S. National Park Service). 2020-10-09. Retrieved 2020-12-06.
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