Celebrate #BlackHistoryMonth by learning about Black History.💜 Meet Byllye Y. Avery (1937-), the founder of the Black Women’s Health Imperative, a trailblazer in women’s health for over 45 years, and thought leader in reproductive justice. She began her work on women’s health and reproductive rights in the late 1960s. Prior to the passage of Roe v. Wade, she helped women access abortion care by helping them find a way to New York, where abortions were safe and legal. In 1974 (after Roe v. Wade passed), she co-founded the Gainesville Women’s Health Center, an early abortion provider in Gainesville, Florida. Four years later, in the same city, she co-founded Birthplace, a midwifery birthing center. In 1983, Avery founded the National Black Women’s Health Project during a conference being held at Spelman College in Atlanta. Prior to founding the Imperative, Avery had been active in the National Women’s Health Network (NWHN), an organization dedicated to addressing women's reproductive health and wellness. In this work, Avery noticed that Black women's needs and concerns were consistently being marginalized and ignored. Avery and her co-activists created the Project/Imperative to address the lack of attention being paid to Black women's health issues. Today and always, we value her work in this movement. ✊ #BLHM #ByllyeAvery #LGBTQ #QueerHistory . Source: ACLU Maine . Quote: “Women’s groups have got to start getting together. Get yourselves together, start doing your organizing. We have to have them all over the country, in every city, every town has got to have it. Every place. You just have to do it,” (Signs: Journal of Women in Culture and Society).
