{"id":13373,"date":"2024-09-11T14:06:53","date_gmt":"2024-09-11T14:06:53","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/9thstreetjournal.org\/?p=13373"},"modified":"2024-09-11T14:06:53","modified_gmt":"2024-09-11T14:06:53","slug":"a-durham-moment-a-homecoming-for-durham-change-maker-pauli-murray","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/9thstreetjournal.org\/2024\/09\/11\/a-durham-moment-a-homecoming-for-durham-change-maker-pauli-murray\/","title":{"rendered":"A Durham Moment: A homecoming for Durham change-maker Pauli Murray"},"content":{"rendered":"
Taylor Mary, dressed in a long lace dress with black combat boots, sits at the top of a grassy hill under a magnolia tree, dipping back and forth in a white wooden rocking chair. Moving in and out of the tree’s shade, she inscribes clothespins with quotes from the Rev. Pauli Murray for an ancestral altar in Murray’s memory.<\/span><\/p>\n Down the hill, hundreds have gathered this Saturday to celebrate the <\/span>grand opening<\/span><\/a> of the Pauli Murray Center for History and Social Justice after 15 years of renovation. The event, centered on Murray\u2019s childhood home on Carroll Street, commemorates a Durham change-maker, a historical figure whose significance fits no single category.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n Born in Maryland in 1910, Murray moved to Durham to live with an aunt and grandparents. <\/span>As an adult, Murray accumulated many titles: writer, activist, agitator, reverend and trailblazer.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n Murray became active in civil rights in the 1930s, working to end segregation in public transport before joining the women\u2019s rights movement. Murray later earned law degrees from Howard University and Yale Law School and in 1977 was ordained as an <\/span>Episcopal priest<\/span><\/a>, earning recognition at the time as the first Black female in that role.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n Yet Murray\u2019s gender identity was complicated. The activist questioned gender and sexuality at a time when being openly queer was illegal, even <\/span>wondering in writing<\/span><\/a> whether this was, \u201cone of nature’s experiments; a girl who should have been a boy.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n Within the newly renovated house-turned-exhibit space, each tension of Murray\u2019s identity is on display. \u201cBetween Male & Female, Between Black & White, Between Homosexual & Heterosexual, Between Working Class & Middle Class,\u201d reads one section in the inaugural exhibit.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n The event is as much of a mosaic as Murray was.<\/span><\/p>\n