Margaret Just Butcher

Margaret Just Butcher (April 28, 1913 - February 7, 2000) was an American educator and civil rights activist. Butcher worked as an English professor at Howard University and Federal City College. She also taught for years overseas. She was a fellow of the Julius Rosenwald Foundation.

During the 1950s, she was a Fulbright Visiting Professor at two universities in France. In the early 1960s she taught in two cities in Morocco, and then served as a cultural affairs attache in Paris, returning to Washington, D.C., in 1968. She taught in its public schools for a time.

Beginning in 1953, Butcher served on the city's Board of Education. She also worked with the NAACP on their suit for desegregation of public schools. Following the ''Brown v. Board of Education'' (1954) ruling by the US Supreme Court, she pressed city officials to proceed with desegregating the schools.

Butcher is also known for her collaborative work with philosopher and cultural leader Alain Locke, who had been a mentor at Howard University. They became friends and she helped care for him in his last illness. From his notes and their discussions, she edited and completed ''The Negro in American Culture'', which was published in 1956 after his death. Provided by Wikipedia