Josephine Clement

Josephine Ophelia Dobbs Clement ( Dobbs; February 9, 1918 – March 23, 1998) was an American politician, teacher, and civil rights activist. She served on the Board of Education of Durham, North Carolina, the first Black woman to do so. Education and early career Josephine Ophelia Dobbs was born on February 9, 1918, in Atlanta, Georgia, the fourth of six daughters to civic leader John Wesley Dobbs and Irene Dobbs ( Thompson). She graduated from Spelman College in 1937 and later earned a Master of Arts degree in home economics from Teachers College, Columbia University. Dobbs taught at Morris Brown College and Savannah State College in Georgia. She married William A. Clement in 1941 and moved to Durham, North Carolina in 1946, where she taught at North Carolina Central University. In the late 1940s, Josephine and William Clement filed lawsuits challenging racial discrimination in schools. Clement and 15 other women leaders in the black community chartered the Durham chapter of the Links, a national service organization, in 1958. Political career In 1971, Clement was appointed to a commission that studied the potential consolidation of Durham City and Durham County. The commission's proposed plan for consolidation was rejected in a 1974 referendum.