Zeta Phi Beta’s Ophelia Settle Egypt Preserved the Voices of Formerly Enslaved People and Advocated for Black Women’s Health

Did you know that one of the pioneering scholars who recorded the firsthand testimonies of formerly enslaved Americans was a member of Zeta Phi Beta Sorority, Inc.? Her name was Ophelia Settle Egypt, and her life’s work preserved Black history and expanded Black health care for generations.

Ophelia Settle Egypt was born on February 20, 1903, near Clarksville, Texas. She graduated from Howard University in 1925 and went on to earn a master’s degree in sociology from the University of Pennsylvania and, later, a master’s in social work from Columbia University. She was a soror of Zeta Phi Beta Sorority, Inc., a member of the Alpha Chapter at Howard University, the very campus where the sorority was founded in 1920. Among her Alpha Chapter sorors was the celebrated writer Zora Neale Hurston.

In the late 1920s, working under the sociologist Dr. Charles S. Johnson at Fisk University, Egypt conducted more than one hundred interviews with elderly Black people who had been born into slavery. According to the National Women’s History Museum, her research was published as Unwritten History of Slavery: Autobiographical Accounts of Negro Ex-Slaves, one of the earliest efforts to preserve the memories of the enslaved in their own words, years before the federal government undertook similar work.

Egypt devoted the rest of her career to serving Black communities. She taught social work at Howard University for more than a decade and became a pioneer in the field of family planning. From 1956 to 1968, she served as the founding director of a Planned Parenthood clinic in Southeast Washington, D.C., bringing reproductive health care and education to families who had long been underserved. In 1981, the clinic was renamed in her honor.

Ophelia Settle Egypt died on May 25, 1984, in Washington, D.C. Her legacy lives on in the archives that safeguard the voices of the enslaved and in the health center that still carries her name.

From the Alpha Chapter at Howard University to the front lines of Black scholarship and health care, Zeta Phi Beta’s Ophelia Settle Egypt spent her life making sure Black stories were told and Black communities were cared for.