With the backing and encouragement of Julia Tutwiler, Miss Dee was one of the ten women from Alabama Normal School to live on campus at the University of Alabama.  She graduated summa cum laude, in 1901.  She returned to Alabama Normal School at Livingston and taught with Julia Tutwiler in 1901-1902.  She was only 20 years old at the time.  I believe that it was during that year, while teaching with Julia Tutwiler, that Miss Dee felt a call to Missionary work in Japan, but she was too young for admission to missionary training at that time.  She decided to continue teaching until she could enroll in the Methodist missionary training.  So, Miss Dee enrolled at Columbia University Teachers College in 1902, to further enhance her teaching skills.  I suspect that Julia Tutwiler may have been involved in Miss Dee’s enrollment at Columbia.  In 1902, Columbia Teacher’s College had only been admitting women for a few years. The first woman to receive a degree from Columbia was in 1887.  But continuing her pioneering tradition, Miss Dee successfully enrolled, and received a BS from Columbia.

 

 

 

 

 

 

I found the documents pictured above in the box of material containing Miss Dee’s memorabilia.

Miss Dee completed her Degree at Columbia University Teachers College in 1903.

The Columbia 1903 Commencement Program from Miss Dee’s Box

Kathrine Tyson, who interviewed Miss Dee for her Alabama Journal article in 1960 indicated that after completing her work at Columbia, Miss Dee returned to the one room school teach.  I believe that would have been the one room school at LaPlace. Because that article was based on a personal interview, I believe that the information is accurate.  But the records are not entirely clear concerning Miss Dee’s activity after completing her work at Columbia. Records from about 1915 from The Methodist Training School in Nashville indicates that Miss Dee “Taught several years at State Normal School Livingstone (sic) Alabama” and “One year secretary Y.W.C.A.,” and “Alabama Girls’ Industrial School, Montevallo, Ala,” before her admission to the Missionary Training School in 1908.” They make no mention of her teaching in the one room school at LaPlace.  But as you can see, these entries themselves are not totally clear and unambiguous.  The only time that I have been able to clearly confirm that she taught at Livingston is before she went to Columbia, where the year, 1901-1902, is confirmed by records.

The Alabama Girls Industrial School that is referred to in the Methodist Training School records had resulted from efforts of Julia Tutwiler to provide vocational educational opportunities for women in Alabama. Julia Tutwiler was offered, but turned down its presidency to remain at Livingston. The school that originated as Alabama Girls Industrial School is now The University of Montevallo. I have confirmed that Miss Dee was secretary of the YWCA at Alabama Girls Industrial School in 2007-2008, just before her admission to Methodist Training School in 1908. The Tyson article indicates that she got her call to missionary work while teaching at Livingston, but was too young for admission.  Apparently she went to Colombia Teacher’s College as an interim measure.  That certainly sounds like something Miss Jule would have encouraged.  Incidental records from Birmingham Southern, dating back to its predecessor, Southern University in Greensboro, Alabama, indicates that she visited family members there in 1906, and that she was serving on the faculty at Livingston at that time, but again, the Livingston records are incomplete, and do not confirm that fact. As stated above, the Tyson article was based on a personal interview, and therefore is credible.  Based on all evidence that I have been able to discover, it appears that Miss Dee returned to LaPlace and taught at the one room school there after finishing her work at Columbia.  Apparently, one Christmas Eve, while she was there, she came to the conclusion that her missionary work needed to be among Blacks in the South instead of Japan.  I have not been able to ascertain when she left her teaching post at the one room school at LaPlace and went back to teach at Livingston with her mentor, Julia Tutwiler.