Revolutionaries: Vicki Garvin

Vicki Garvin (1915-2007) was a political activist, Pan-Africanist, workers rights organizer, and civil rights leader first in Harlem and later internationally, in Nigeria, China, and Ghana. She was a prominent figure in the Black Left movement during the height of McCarthyism and greatly shaped the political worldview of Malcolm X. Throughout her life, she served as a mentor for Black activists and trailblazer for radical Black intellectual life and politics.

For Further Reading:

• She Who Struggle: Vicki Garvin
• Vicki Garvin was a revolutionary at home and abroad
• Black Women Radicals and the Making of the Politics and Legacy of Malcolm X

This Black History Month, we’re talking about Revolutionaries: Black women who led struggles for liberation from violent governments, colonial rulers, and enslavers. These women had the courage to imagine radically different worlds – and used their power to try and pull those worlds into view.

History classes can get a bad rap, and sometimes for good reason. When we were students, we couldn’t help wondering... where were all the ladies at? Why were so many incredible stories missing from the typical curriculum? Enter, Womanica. On this Wonder Media Network podcast we explore the lives of inspiring women in history you may not know about, but definitely should.

Every weekday, listeners explore the trials, tragedies, and triumphs of groundbreaking women throughout history who have dramatically shaped the world around us. In each 5 minute episode, we’ll dive into the story behind one woman listeners may or may not know–but definitely should. These diverse women from across space and time are grouped into easily accessible and engaging monthly themes like Educators, Villains, Indigenous Storytellers, Activists, and many more.  Womanica is hosted by WMN co-founder and award-winning journalist Jenny Kaplan. The bite-sized episodes pack painstakingly researched content into fun, entertaining, and addictive daily adventures. 

Womanica was created by Liz Kaplan and Jenny Kaplan, executive produced by Jenny Kaplan, and produced by Grace Lynch, Maddy Foley, Brittany Martinez, Edie Allard, Lindsey Kratochwill, Adesuwa Agbonile, Carmen Borca-Carrillo, Taylor Williamson, Sara Schleede, Paloma Moreno Jimenez, Luci Jones and Abbey Delk. Special thanks to Shira Atkins. 

Original theme music composed by Miles Moran.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:01):
Heyl. I'm Aaron Hanes. I'm the editor at large for
The Nineteenth News, a nonprofit newsroom reporting on gender politics
and policy. I'm also the host of a brand new
weekly podcast from the Nineteenth News and Wonder Media Network
called The Amendment. Each week, we're bringing you a conversation
about gender politics and the unfinished work of American democracy.

(00:24):
Our very first episode features my dear friend and Pulitzer
Prize winning journalist Nicole Hannah Jones. It's out now, so
please go listen and follow the show. On top of
all of this, I'm your guest host for this month
of Wamanica, this Black History Month. We're talking about revolutionaries,
the black women who led struggles for liberation from violent governments,

(00:47):
colonial rulers, and enslavers. These women had the courage to
imagine radically different worlds, and they use their power to
try and pull those worlds into view. Today, they were
talking about a prominent activist who worked at the intersection
of civil rights and labor organizing. She paved the way

(01:08):
for a radical reimagining of racial politics and drew attention
to the plight of black women in America and abroad.
Let's talk about Vicky Garvin. Vicky was born Victoria Holmes
in Richmond, Virginia, in nineteen fifteen. Vicki's family, like many

(01:30):
other black families at the time, moved north to Harlem
during the Great Depression. Her mother was a domestic worker
for upper class white families. Her father was a plasterer who,
due to racism and construction unions, was often out of work.
Vicky saw first hand the kinds of injustice that her
parents experienced in the workplace. She and her family often

(01:52):
found themselves forced to move apartments on short notice, leaving
in the middle of the night to escape eviction. Vicky
already had the activist spirit in her by the time
she graduated from high school and majored in political science
at Hunter College. In her teens, she got involved with
her church's youth program, a group led by future leftist

(02:13):
congressman Adam Clayton Powell Junior. She continued her activism there
after graduation, attending her first picket line during the Don't
Buy Where You Can't Work protest in Harlem, which Powell organized.
As an adult, Vicky was on the front lines at
protests for black civil rights and labor rights. She was
a switchboard operator at the American League for Peace and Democracy,

(02:36):
as well as a member of its corresponding union, the
Professional Workers of America. There she saw the power of
workplace organizing. In nineteen forty, Vicky moved to Northampton, Massachusetts,
where she studied economics at Smith College. She became interested
in Marxist theory and the way that race and class

(02:57):
struggles intertwine. When she graduated, she became the first African
American woman to earn a master's degree in economics from
Smith College. During the early nineteen forties, Vicky also became
friends with the young Malcolm X, who was working as
a bartender in Harlem at the time. She encouraged Malcolm
to be politically active and invited him to lectures. Those

(03:19):
conversations sparked a lifelong friendship between the two activists, who
spent time exchanging ideas about revolution and political economy. Vicky
was also a founding board member of the newspaper Freedom,
which focused on the plights of African Americans, particularly black women,
and challenged America's conception of itself as a democracy. Inspired

(03:41):
by her studies, writing and conversations with other activists, Vicky
joined the Communist Party in nineteen forty seven. As her
reputation and popularity grew, she helped found the National Negro
Labor Council, or the NNLC. In fact, she helped organize
the first NNLC convention in nineteen fifty one, which hosted

(04:02):
around one thousand delegates. Vicki was a defiant voice of
the black left, though during the Cold War she found
little sympathy from mainstream politics or from her own politics
and labor affiliations. In the late nineteen forties, she openly
criticized her union for not milicantly supporting the rights of

(04:22):
black workers, calling upon the organization to do better. In
nineteen fifty three, at the height of anti communist McCarthyism,
Vicki was called to testify before the House on American
Activities Committee. By the early sixties, Vicky had resigned from
the Communist Party and found fewer and fewer opportunities for
her in the United States, but she certainly wasn't ready

(04:44):
to stop working. Vicky turned her attention abroad. She began
traveling all over observing how the political and social issues
she witnessed on American soil manifested internationally. Her first stop
was Nigeria, where she started focusing her work on anti colonialism.
After two years in Legos, she intended to return to America,

(05:08):
but a fateful stopover changed her plans. In nineteen fifty seven,
Ghana had gained its independence from Great Britain. Its leader,
Quame and Kruma, was a militant Pan Africanist. By the
nineteen sixties, Ghana had attracted an expanding group of black
American intellectuals, and soon Vicky was among its ranks. She

(05:30):
roomed with Maya Angelou and later lived next door to W. E. B.
Du Bois. In nineteen sixty four, Vicki's old friend Malcolm
came to Ghana for a visit. Vicky guided him around,
mentoring him and helping him build relationships with radicals outside
of America who came from places like Algeria, Cuba, and China.

(05:50):
Malcolm's tour of Africa was absolutely critical to the evolution
of his political views. Vicki also spent some time in China,
editing an English newspaper in Beijing and teaching English in Shanghai.
She eventually returned to the United States, where she continued
to mentor up and coming activists across movements. Vicky died

(06:11):
in two thousand and seven and continues to be remembered
as a key mentor and leader in social movements across
three different continents. During her memorial service, a pamphlet distributed
to guests concluded with one of Vicki's calls to action.
Of course, there will be twists and turns, but victory
in the race belongs to the long distance runners, not sprinters. Everywhere,

(06:36):
the just slogan is reverberated no justice, no peace. All month,
We're talking about revolutionaries. For more information, you can find
us on Facebook and Instagram at Wamanica Podcast Special thanks
to co creators Jenny and Liz Kaplan for having me
as a guest host. Talk to you tomorrow