A century after Black History Month began, Huntsville honors six Black suffragists whose courage laid the foundation for the Civil Rights Movement.
Speakin’ Out News
(Historic Huntsville Foundation)
As the nation observes Black History Month 2026, marking 100 years since historian Dr. Carter G. Woodson founded Negro History Week, the moment calls for more than reflection. It calls for recognition of the Black Americans who helped expand democracy long before their contributions were widely acknowledged — especially Black women whose courage laid the groundwork for the modern Civil Rights Movement.
In Huntsville, that legacy came into full view on October 24, 2021, during a joyous homecoming celebration for the ages at William Hooper Councill Memorial Park.
That afternoon, Alabama Governor Kay Ivey, Huntsville Mayor Tommy Battle, the Historic Huntsville Foundation, hundreds of community supporters, and devoted family members gathered to dedicate Alabama’s first historic marker recognizing Black suffragists — six women who were among the first African American women allowed to register to vote in Madison County following the ratification of the 19th Amendment in 1920.
At the center of that history stands Mary Binford Wood.
A Huntsville Voting Rights Pioneer
Mary Binford Wood, photographed standing second from the left in her 1897 Howard University graduation class, represented a generation of Black women who pursued education, leadership, and civic responsibility despite systemic barriers.
Wood and her husband, Henry C. Binford Jr., both graduated from Howard University in Washington, D.C. The couple returned to Huntsville, where Henry Binford became principal of the Public School for Black students, later known as William Hooper Councill High School. Mary Binford Wood taught in Huntsville’s segregated public schools, shaping young minds and modeling excellence in an era designed to suppress it.
Her commitment to education extended naturally into civic engagement.
When the 19th Amendment granted women the right to vote in 1920, 1,370 women registered in Huntsville. Only six were Black.
“They were pursuing the opportunities that the circumstances of their lives put before them and going as far as they possibly could,” Brenda Chunn, president of the William Hooper Councill High School Alumni Association, told AL.com. “That included voting.”
Mary Binford Wood was one of those six.
Six Women Who Expanded Democracy
The historic marker unveiled in 2021 bears the names of:
- Mary Wood Binford (Jordan)
- Ellen Scruggs Brandon
- India Leslie Herndon
- Lou Bertha Perkins Johnson
- Celia Love McCrary
- Dora Fackler Lowery
Four of the six women were college graduates and former teachers, and most shared deep ties to Councill High School — an institution that served as an intellectual and cultural anchor for Huntsville’s Black community during segregation.
“There are currently no historic markers in Huntsville or Madison County recognizing the contributions African American women have made to our community,” Mayor Tommy Battle wrote in his recommendation to the Alabama Historical Commission, urging approval of the marker.
For Chunn, the marker’s placement in Councill Memorial Park was especially fitting.
“The women’s families had connections to Councill school, but their desire to vote said something bigger,” she told AL.com. “It reflected the school’s mission. All eyes in the African American community were on every aspect of development, of forward movement, of momentum.”
Preserving a Story Once Overlooked
The research and documentation behind the marker were led by the Historic Huntsville Foundation, with significant contributions from Black women leaders in the community.
Foundation President Donna Castellano said the project revealed how interconnected these women were through education, family, and civic life. Key figures included Brenda Chunn and Ollye Conley, former principal of Huntsville’s Academy of Sciences and Foreign Languages and longtime caretaker of Glenwood Cemetery, where the six suffragists are buried.
Castellano noted that several of the women had fathers or husbands who held elected office before Alabama’s 1901 Constitution stripped voting rights from more than 170,000 Black men.
“It is highly likely,” Castellano wrote, “that having seen their community become increasingly vulnerable to racial injustice due to their loss of voting rights, they became more committed to the necessity of voting as a remedy for Black citizens.”
From Suffrage to the Civil Rights Movement
One honoree, Dora Fackler Lowery, offers a direct link between early Black suffrage and the national Civil Rights Movement. She was the mother of Dr. Joseph Lowery, a co-founder of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference and a central figure in the fight for passage of the Voting Rights Act of 1965.
Dora Lowery lived to see that legislation become law — a culmination of the struggle she and other Black women began decades earlier by insisting on their right to vote.
Why This Story Matters in 2026
Black History Month 2026 is not simply a centennial milestone. It is a reminder that Black history is living history — especially as voting rights remain contested across the country.
Alabama did not officially recognize women’s right to vote until 1953, more than 30 years after the 19th Amendment was ratified. The courage of Huntsville’s first Black women voters underscores a truth that remains relevant today: democracy expands only when people demand inclusion.
Mary Binford Wood and her peers did not seek recognition. They sought participation.
A century after Carter G. Woodson challenged America to tell the truth about its past, Huntsville’s Black suffragists stand as proof that Black women have always been central to the nation’s democratic progress.
Their names are now etched in stone — not as symbols of the past, but as reminders of the work still ahead.
