A new sculpture depicting a Windsor trailblazer will go up downtown this fall.
Mary Ann Shadd Cary was an anti-slavery activist, journalist, teacher, and lawyer. She was the first woman in Canada and in all of North America to establish a newspaper, "The Provincial Freeman."
If you do not know who Mary Ann Shadd Cary is, it is not surprising.
"Mary Ann Shadd Cary is well known to many of us who study, teach or write about Black history all across North America, but she is not as well known in the broader community of Windsor as she should be," said Irene Moore Davis, the president of the Essex County Black Historical Research Society.
Shadd Cary died in 1893. She was named a Person of National Historic Significance by the Canadian government in 1994.
The sculpture will be located outside Windsor Hall at Ferry Street and Pitt Street West. The building now houses the University of Windsor's School of Social Work, but at one time it was the home of the Windsor Star.
Moore Davis said many of Shadd's descendants, including herself, will be at the unveiling this October, either in-person or virtually.
"There are many Shadd descendants living across Southwestern Ontario, Southeastern Michigan, and beyond," Moore Davis said. "There's a fairly vast network of descendants of Mary Ann's siblings who keep in touch regularly with one another and with the community of historians who continue to research her."
The sculpture is a work by Donna Mayne, and the unveiling will coincide with Shadd Cary's birthday on October 9 and Women's History Month.
