Myra Colson Callis

Colson was born in Petersburg, Virginia, the daughter of James Major Colson II and Kate Deaver Hill Colson. Her father was principal of the Virginia Normal and Collegiate Institute. Her mother and siblings also worked in education;{{Cite web |title=Cortlandt Matthews Colson |url=https://badahistory.net/view.php?ID=89&sc=all&s=cl |access-date=2025-02-02 |website=Blacks@Dartmouth, 1775 to 1960}} her older sister was educator Edna Meade Colson.{{Cite news |last=Woody |first=S. J. |date=1955-10-15 |title=Charles S. Colson dies in New Jersey |url=https://www.newspapers.com/article/the-afro-american-charles-s-colson-dies/164525969/ |access-date=2025-02-02 |work=The Afro-American |pages=21 |via=Newspapers.com}}

Colson graduated from Fisk University in 1915; she and her sister Edna both spoke at the commencement ceremony.{{Cite news |date=1915-06-07 |title=Dr. Brown Preaches to Fisk Students |url=https://www.newspapers.com/article/the-tennessean-dr-brown-preaches-to-fis/125620789/ |access-date=2025-02-02 |work=The Tennessean |pages=10 |via=Newspapers.com}} She earned a master's degree in social service administration at the University of Chicago, with a thesis titled "Home Work Among Negro Women in Chicago."{{Cite book |last=Colson |first=Myra Hill |url=https://books.google.com/books/about/Home_Work_Among_Negro_Women_in_Chicago.html?id=u39LcZADuTEC |title=Home Work Among Negro Women in Chicago |date=1928 |publisher=University of Chicago, School of Social Service Administration. |language=en}} She was a member of Alpha Kappa Alpha.

Callis taught high school science in Virginia for several years after college. She began working for the YWCA in 1919, and held jobs at YWCA branches in Ohio, Pennsylvania, and Chicago between 1919 and 1927. She was the first African-American woman to earn certification from the national training school for YWCA secretaries. From 1928 to 1930, she was a researcher and instructor at the Tuskegee Institute.{{Cite news |date=1929-09-12 |title=Educational Mecca of Southland Opens Another Session with Large College Enrollment |url=https://www.newspapers.com/article/the-black-dispatch-educational-mecca-of/164525017/ |access-date=2025-02-02 |work=The Black Dispatch |pages=2 |via=Newspapers.com}} From 1930 to 1932, she worked with Carter G. Woodson on data for his The Negro in the Professions project.{{Cite book |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=cNjIxckKsNAC&newbks=1&newbks_redir=0&lpg=PA162&dq=Myra%20Colson%20Callis&pg=PA162#v=onepage&q=Myra%20Colson%20Callis&f=false |title=Carter G. Woodson: A Life in Black History |publisher=LSU Press |isbn=978-0-8071-4125-0 |pages=162 |language=en}} She was a social worker and researcher in Washington, D.C. in the 1930s and 1940s, specializing in employment and placement services for Black women.{{Cite book |last=Murphy |first=Mary-Elizabeth B. |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=E8twDwAAQBAJ&newbks=1&newbks_redir=0&lpg=PA232&dq=Myra%20Colson%20Callis&pg=PA139#v=onepage&q=Myra%20Colson%20Callis&f=false |title=Jim Crow Capital: Women and Black Freedom Struggles in Washington, D.C., 1920–1945 |date=2018-09-28 |publisher=UNC Press Books |isbn=978-1-4696-4673-2 |page=128-130, 139 |language=en}}{{Cite news |date=1934-01-29 |title=CWA Inaugurates Survey to Determine Status of Negro Unemployment in Washington, D.C. |url=https://www.newspapers.com/article/atlanta-daily-world-cwa-inaugurates-surv/164524304/ |access-date=2025-02-02 |work=Atlanta Daily World |pages=2 |via=Newspapers.com}} She also spoke on the topic to community groups{{Cite news |date=1934-04-21 |title=Delvers Presenting Myra Colson Callis |url=https://www.newspapers.com/article/the-afro-american-delvers-presenting-myr/164524567/ |access-date=2025-02-02 |work=The Afro-American |pages=26 |via=Newspapers.com}}{{Cite news |date=1933-11-05 |title=Phyllis Wheatley Y. W. C. A. |url=https://www.newspapers.com/article/evening-star-phyllis-wheatley-y-w-c-a/164525368/ |access-date=2025-02-02 |work=Evening star |pages=25 |via=Newspapers.com}} and YWCA conferences.{{Cite news |date=1929-06-29 |title=Y. W. C. A. Holds Conference in Atlanta |url=https://www.newspapers.com/article/new-pittsburgh-courier-y-w-c-a-holds/164525501/ |access-date=2025-02-02 |work=New Pittsburgh Courier |pages=6 |via=Newspapers.com}} In 1935, she joined the faculty of the Atlanta School of Social Service.{{Cite news |date=1935-03-05 |title=Welfare Work Aide |url=https://www.newspapers.com/article/times-herald-welfare-work-aide/164524689/ |access-date=2025-02-02 |work=Times Herald |pages=6 |via=Newspapers.com}}

After World War II, Callis was supervisor of household operations at the United States Employment Service (USES) in Washington.{{Cite news |date=1949-11-30 |title=U.S. Now Supplies Baby-Sitters on Moment's Notice to USES |url=https://www.newspapers.com/image/868225227/?match=1&clipping_id=164526369 |access-date=2025-02-02 |work=Evening Star |pages=25 |via=Newspapers.com}} She retired from USES in 1951.{{Cite news |date=1951-02-03 |title=USES Employee Honored on Retirement |url=https://www.newspapers.com/article/the-afro-american-uses-employee-honored/164526591/ |access-date=2025-02-02 |work=The Afro-American |pages=26 |via=Newspapers.com}}{{Cite news |date=1951-01-27 |title=Leisure for a Lovely Lady |url=https://www.newspapers.com/article/washington-afro-american-leisure-for-a-l/164526951/ |access-date=2025-02-02 |work=Washington Afro American |pages=11 |via=Newspapers.com}}

• "Negro Home Workers in Chicago" (1923){{Cite journal |last=Colson |first=Myra Hill |date=September 1928 |title=Negro Home Workers in Chicago |url=https://www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/10.1086/630416 |journal=Social Service Review |language=en |volume=2 |issue=3 |pages=385–413 |doi=10.1086/630416 |issn=0037-7961}}
• "The Employment of Negroes in the District of Columbia" (1936, with Lorenzo Johnston Greene and Carter G. Woodson){{Cite book |last=Greene |first=Lorenzo Johnston |url=https://catalog.hathitrust.org/Record/006578116 |title=The employment of Negroes in the District of Columbia |last2=Callis |first2=Myra Colson |date=1936 |publisher=The Association for the Study of Negro Life and History, inc. |location=Washington, D.C.}}

Colson married physician and medical school professor Henry Arthur Callis in 1927, as his third wife. Her husband died in 1974,[https://books.google.com/books?id=DlsDAAAAMBAJ&lpg=PA18&dq=Myra%20Colson%20Callis&pg=PA18#v=onepage&q=Myra%20Colson%20Callis&f=false "Founder of Alphas, Medic Association Dies at 87; Leaves Body to Science"] Jet (December 5, 1974): 18. and she died in 1979. Her papers are in the collection of Howard University.[Staff, MSRC, "CALLIS, Myra" (2015). Manuscript Division Finding Aids. 26.

https://dh.howard.edu/finaid_manu/26 Myra C. Callis Papers finding aid] (1999), Manuscript Division, Howard University Library. Her family's papers are in the Johnston Memorial Library, Virginia State University.{{Cite web |title=A Guide to the Papers of The Colson-Hill FamilyColson-Hill 1965-13 |url=https://ead.lib.virginia.edu/vivaxtf/view?docId=vsu/vipets00050.xml |access-date=2025-02-02 |website=Archival Resources of the Virginias |language=English}}

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• [https://credo.library.umass.edu/view/full/mums312-b065-i095 "Letter from Myra Colson Callis to W. E. B. Du Bois, August 24, 1933"], in the W. E. B. Du Bois Papers at the University of Massachusetts at Amherst

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Category:1892 births

Category:1979 deaths

Category:People from Petersburg, Virginia

Category:Fisk University alumni

Category:University of Chicago alumni

Category:American social workers

Category:Alpha Kappa Alpha members