While World War II raged on, many war correspondents were tasked with getting information out to the people at home. Elizabeth Murphy Moss served as one the first African American women to go overseas, playing a vital role reporting from Europe while in an active war zone.
In 1944, Moss was sent out to report on World War II, covering the European theater from London, and is recognized as the first accredited black woman to be an overseas war correspondent. Active for about a year, her time there was when she first saw the glaring need for representation in not only her field, but across America.
She began writing for one of the first news-publications started by African Americans, the Baltimore Afro-American News, known as AFRO. Her grandfather was one of the founders of the paper, with her father serving as an editor. Moss’s most popular work was her column, “If You Ask Me” which continued in the paper for 48 years. While working under her father, she acted as a writer, reporter, columnist, publisher, and when he retired, eventually an editor and treasurer. For 32 years, she was involved with AFRO further as a member of the Board of Directors.
With a bachelor’s degree in journalism from the University of Minnesota, she also attended the renowned historically black University of Howard. Moss worked to receive a certificate in editorial management from the American Press Institute for Managing Editors of Columbia University.
Through her experiences, Moss realized there had to be a change in how people of color were viewed in the professional world, and knew that education was an effective way to change the playing field. This led to her later becoming the first black woman to serve on the Baltimore School Board, her main focus her time there were her tireless efforts for the desegregation of Baltimore schools. She expressed in an interview with the Maryland Center For History and Culture that while her work was rewarding she was often overwhelmed with pressure. “…I felt I was representing other parents of children in the city and it was incumbent upon me to express their viewpoint, and the opposition to the continuation of segregation in assignment of pupils and assignment of faculty.” Holding her position from 1960 to 1974, she oversaw the mass destruction.
Though she passed at 81 in 1998, Elizabeth Murphy Moss not only broke boundaries in her field, but encouraged all minorities to reach their goals and not let anything or one stop them.
