Wilhelmena Rhodes Kelly

Wilhelmena Rhodes Kelly
Born
Wilhelmena Rhodes

(1946-12-11)December 11, 1946
Brooklyn, New York City
DiedOctober 16, 2019(2019-10-16) (aged 72)
Alma materBrooklyn College
OccupationGenealogist
Known forAfrican-American genealogy

Wilhelmena Rhodes Kelly (née Rhodes December 11, 1946 – October 16, 2019) was an African-American genealogist who traced her American lineage to the April 5, 1614, union of Pocahontas and John Rolfe.[1] She was also a member of the Jamestowne Society. In 2019 she became the New York State Regent and a member of the National Board of Management, highest ranking woman of color in the National Society Daughters of the American Revolution (NSDAR),[2] since its founding in 1890.[3] She was a pioneer of African-American genealogy. Born and raised in Brooklyn, she was a local Brooklyn historian and member of the Society of Old Brooklynites (SOB), one of the borough's oldest civic organizations. She was the author of books on Bedford-Stuyvesant as well as the Crown Heights and Weeksville sections of Brooklyn, and family genealogy books tracing her family's American roots.

  1. ^ Mackey, Sonjia (6 March 2017). "Women's History Month: Wilhelmena Rhodes Kelly". Griots Republic Magazine. Archived from the original on 6 March 2017.
  2. ^ "CUNY TV Profiles Wilhelmena Rhodes Kelly, First Woman of Color to Start DAR Chapter » CUNY TV » City University Television". tv.cuny.edu.
  3. ^ McGinnis, Lindsey (October 5, 2021). "Who's a Daughter of the American Revolution? Answer Grows more diverse". The Christian Science Monitor.