Thelma Lovette Morris represents her family’s fourth generation to belong to the Aurora Reading Club of Pittsburgh. She embraces its historic value as one of the nation’s oldest continually operating African American arts and cultural organizations.
Rachel Lovett Jones, a Hill District resident and her great-great aunt, was among its six founders. Her great-grandmother Hannah Grinage Lovett – later the family added an e to the end of the Lovette name – and Rachel’s sister-in-law was a charter member. Anna Grinage Tankard, her great-great aunt and Hannah’s sister and Caroline Lovett, Hannah’s daughter and Morris’ great-aunt, also joined.
Those original founders and members adopted the motto “Lifting As We Climb.” They stated then that the club’s purpose was to pursue “a systematic course of study in a manner to be decided by a majority of the membership and shall be for the mutual improvement of the membership in literature, art, science and matters relating to the vital interests of the day,” according to information provided by the club.
This Saturday its members and guests, estimated to be 150, will celebrate its 130th anniversary at the Energy Innovation Center in the Hill District. Morris and her fellow co-chair Regina Wilson selected “Respect the Past, Honor the Present, Plan for the Future” as the theme for this year’s event. Pittsburgh Public Theater managing director Shaunda McDill will deliver the keynote address, and music will be provided by Calvin Stemley.
Its 25 members uphold many of the traditions begun by the founders, including anniversary celebrations with friends every five years. Members continue to hold formal meetings seven times a year to discuss books and/or hear from guest speakers, and they did so through the pandemic. Throughout the year members attend lectures, performances, concerts, visual arts events and fundraisers as well, according to club information. Aurora members engage in socially conscious initiatives by giving their time, talent and treasure to local, national and international causes.
Members are added to the group only when an opening occurs. Member who move away can remain as associate members, Morris said.
That happened to her. Upon her retirement, she and her husband moved to Arizona and stayed there for 11 years. A death in her family prompted her to come back to Pittsburgh, although she visits family who live in that western state.
Morris, a retired speech and language specialist and assistant director of human resources for Pittsburgh Public Schools who lives in the Hill District, said the club started planning this anniversary celebration about two years ago. As part of it, the club will publish a yearbook that will list all the books members have read and all its activities.
Members make suggestions as to those books and volunteer to facilitate the discussion. Morris found James McBride’s “The Heaven and Earth Grocery Store,” the October selection, fascinating. “We talked about different things in that community that were similar to places here in Pittsburgh,” Morris explained. “The Hill District. The Jewish community that had been there in the Hill.”
She is looking forward to the book chosen for April, “Medgar and Myrlie: The Love Story that Awakened America by Joy Reid.”
Linking their reading to the city and greater community as well as important issues has been a club tradition, according to the anniversary information. Members adopted causes and supported them raising funds and donating goods. They spread goodwill by visiting the infirmed and knitting sweaters for enlisted soldiers.
The club continues to support many different organizations that focus on reading, Morris said, including Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh and the Pittsburgh Arts & Lecture series. This year it has selected Percival Everett , author of “Erasure” and “James,” and will contribute toward his appearance in March.
Its Edith Holland Memorial Book Fund is dedicated to a member who always encouraged contributions to organizations that gave books to young people. “After the assassination of Medgar Evers, in 1971 Aurora donated books to Jackson, Mississippi [at her urging]. When she passed, we established the book fund in her memory. People make contributions to support us doing something for books for young people. We still receive monies for that fund,” Morris said.
This year the fund’s donation has been given to Pittsburgh Arts & Lectures and will enable the purchase of 30 copies of Antonia Hilton’s book “Madness.” Morris said, “The executive director had asked about different groups purchasing books so people can read them and have serious discussions about mental health. … They will figure out how to engage people in the discussion.” Hylton will present a lecture here this coming February.
During Morris’ tenure as president, the club agreed to have the Heinz History Center be the repository for its archives. Before that, she said, the material passed from president to president. Since 2002 that has included meeting minutes, yearbooks, anniversary programs, newspaper clippings, artifacts and projects that have been created by members to celebrate milestone anniversaries. The archives are available to the public upon request.
Some of the standout pieces in the archives include a 2004 quilt that reflected the lives of the members, created under the guidance of noted fiber artist Tina Brewer, along with an accompanying photo album of their work; a 2009 scrapbook that profiled then current members; “Reflections of an Aurora Woman,” a sculpture created by internationally acclaimed artist Vanessa German in 2014; audio interviews featuring remembrances by many current Aurora members produced by the Saturday Light Brigade in 2018 for the 125th anniversary celebration; and “Our Members, Our Story” produced in 2019 that not only profiled club members but also served as a companion piece to the 1957 version of “Who’s Who in Aurora.”
Other club partnerships have included the United Black Book Clubs of Pittsburgh, the August Wilson African American Cultural Center, the Pittsburgh Cultural Trust, and the Friday Club of Greensburg.
The Greenburg club’s leaders reached out after reading media coverage of Aurora’s 110th anniversary. Morris said it was interesting because the Friday Cub is an all-white organization and Aurora has been predominantly Black, with some white women joining over the years. “At least once a year we did something special,” she continued. “We saw a play about the Johnstown flood. We shared our book lists. We both read ‘Night’ by Elie Wiesel. It’s been many years ago, but I remember it vividly.”
Aurora club members have had many opportunities to meet and speak with authors. The History Center notes that the late Alex Haley, author of “Roots,” was a guest of the club. Members attend Arts & Lectures presentations and other programs throughout the city, always meeting interesting authors. And some have Pittsburgh connections.
For example, Morris said members heard Carla Hayden, the 14th librarian of Congress, who appeared via Zoom at a Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh, University of Pittsburgh School of Computing and Information and Allegheny County Library Association event this year.
“It was fascinating to hear her,” the first woman and first African American to lead the Library of Congress, she said. Club members could make comments during the presentation, and she told Hayden that her husband, Dr. Gregory Morris, was the the late Billy Strayhorn’s nephew.
Also this May Morris attended an event honoring Freedom House, the trailblazing Hill District ambulance service, and met Kevin Hazzard. He wrote a book, “American Sirens: The Incredible Story About the Black Men Who Became America’s First Paramedics,” about it. Her mother had been part of the service’s original committee and is mentioned in the book.
Attending these events is just one way that individually and collectively, members are actively engaged in the community as civic leaders, board members and volunteers. Professionally, members have and continue to hold leadership positions within their organizations, with many breaking racial and/or gender barriers, and avidly volunteering, the anniversary information stated. Morris has served on many community boards, including becoming the first African American president of the Junior League of Pittsburgh.
With this year’s anniversary celebration theme, club members new activities have been introduced “to ensure that the Aurora Reading Club of Pittsburgh maintains its important place in Pittsburgh’s and our nation’s history and challenges future generations to carry on these noteworthy traditions.”
Those new activities include the club’s first website launched this year and a Wikipedia page.
A reminder of that legacy will be on display at Saturday’s anniversary: the 2004 quilt member created, including Morris’ square, from the Heinz History Center archives.
“Mine was about my legacy in Aurora, and it includes pictures of Rachel, Hannah and Caroline,” she said.
Helen is a copy editor at the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, but she's currently on strike. Contact her at hfallon@unionprogress.com.