League of Women For Community Service (LWCS)

Founded in 1918   The League of Women for Community Service, one of the nation’s oldest continuing Black women’s clubs, has played a leadership role in promoting culture, education, and service in the community for more than a century. The League’s first president, Maria L. Baldwin, was the first Black woman appointed principal of a public school in the Northeast, beginning in 1889. From its origin as a mutual aid group, the League’s founders provided social services and relief to Black soldiers stationed around Boston in the segregated U.S. military during World War I. The League went on to host social gatherings, lectures, exhibits, and meetings for civic and community organizations, and built an extensive library and archive. In the 1940s and 1950s, the League housed Black women college students who were not welcome in local dormitories. Notably, Coretta Scott King lived here while a student in Boston.