Merze Tate Explorers' Club 10th Anniversary!

This interview is with Sonya Hollins, the founder of the Merze Tate Explorers' Club. The Club is celebrating its tenth anniversary this year. The mission of the Merze Tate Explorers' Club is to provide young girls of color with opportunities to experience different places (travel) and cultural environments.

Merze Tate

Who was Merze Tate? Can you give us a perspective on her life?

Merze Tate’s legacy includes a bequest of more than a million dollars to her alma mater, Western Michigan University. When she died in 1996, her obituary in the Washington Post noted her work with the U.S. State Department as an expert in Disarmament, being the first African American graduate of Oxford University, and being one of the first African American Fulbright Scholars in India.  When you think of the time of her birth (1905) African Americans were facing devastating Jim Crow segregation, particularly in the South. However, Merze, being raised in Mecosta County, Michigan in a racially diverse farm town where people lived in harmony. Limitations on what she could be based on race, were nonexistent; she could dream big…and she did!

Tate left Mecosta County as a 10th grader and headed to Battle Creek Central High School to complete 11th and 12th grades. She graduated with all A’s, despite living as a maid in the home of a white family for room and board. After high school she went on to Western Normal School (WMU) where she became the first African American to earn a B.A. in Education in 1927 (earning a four-year degree in three years!). While she worked hard and excelled, Jim Crow laws stifled her dream to teach high school in Michigan.

Sonya Hollins, Founder, Merze Tate Explorers

She left Michigan to Indiana where (with the help of Dwight Waldo, president of WMU) she took a job at an all African -American high school founded by the Ku Klux Klan. The KKK established Crispus Attucks High School as a way to segregate high school students. All teachers at the school also were African American; Merze was their first History teacher. During her few years at the school, she created a Travel Club. She took students to Niagara Falls, Pennsylvania, and Washington D.C. during the Depression Era. Her goal was to expose these students to a world beyond Indianapolis and careers they could strive to obtain outside of the servant roles many of their parents faced.

In 1932, Merze left secondary education to pursue a degree at Oxford University where she became the first African American to earn a degree from that historic university. She already had earned a M.A. from Columbia University through correspondence courses, and had traveled abroad to study a summer in Switzerland. After graduating from Oxford in 1935, she taught college history at African American universities. She retired from Howard University, but not before becoming a Fulbright Scholar in India, expert in disarmament, author of international history books, inventor, photographer, reporter, and world traveler. In 1941 she earned another first as the first African American female to earn a Ph.D. in Political Science from Harvard University.

Merze is buried next to her parents and siblings in her hometown of Blanchard, Michigan. 

What do you think motivated Merze’s love of education and travel?

I feel Merze was motivated to travel at an early age. It was during her nearly four-mile walks to and from school each day that she gazed through her history books, imagining herself in the exotic lands pictured in the books. Her grandparents were pioneers who came to Michigan from Ohio. When the family left the Left Settlement (her mother’s maiden name), they were leaving behind a legacy of being Underground Railroad conductors who helped countless fugitive slaves escape for a better life. I believe her family encouraged Merze to leave Blanchard to finish school in Battle Creek because they knew it would help her achieve more than her small town could provide. Merze was fearless in seeking out new opportunities without reservation. 

Why is Merze Tate’s example a powerful one? Especially for young girls of color?

Because Merze accomplished so many things during a time when so many limitations were placed on People of Color and women, that they have little excuse to succeed. When they see how, before African Americans could vote, or ride in the front of a bus, or eat at a lunch counter, etc., that Merze defied the odds. Merze didn’t look for anyone to GIVE her any rights. She realized that those in Europe and beyond the U.S. saw her for her talents and contributions, not her color. When girls realize that, while there is still sexism and racism, there are women who defied the odds and succeeded. Because of Merze’s example, girls can use her as a role model and also be fearless in their pursuit of whatever they imagine.

What about the Merze Tate Explorer’s Club? What was your motivation to start the club?

My motivation to begin the (formerly Travel Club) Explorers, was a black and white image of Merze with 40 African American students, headed to Washington D.C. in 1932. When I saw that image in her scrapbooks in the archives at WMU, I was captivated by the faces of Merze and the students. For many of them, that trip would take then farther than some of their parents ever imagined. That trip to Washington D.C., our nation’s capital, would be the defying moment in the lives of many of them. After that trip, they no longer could have excuses as to why they couldn’t travel. After that trip they could not go back to just seeing their own neighborhood as their boundary in life. I wanted to bring that same experience to young girls…a life without boundaries. 

Do you remember the Explorer Club’s first trip? Where did you go? How many travelers went with you?

The first REAL trip outside Kalamazoo for the Explorers was in 2009. We took more than a dozen girls by train to Battle Creek. While the city is only 20 minutes away, to the girls it was an adventure they would never forget. Many of them had never been on a train or to Battle Creek. The experience of learning about the Underground Railroad in Battle Creek while also experiencing the modern-day railroad was a pivotal moment in our organization. We had now stepped out of our city limits…there was no turning back to the places we could go.

Where else have Club members traveled over the years?

Over the years the Explorers have traveled through the path of Merze to her hometown and to Crispus Attucks High School. Students have visited Canada, Paris, France, Versailles, Venice, Florence, Rome, and Hawaii as a group. Individually, girls have traveled the world through study abroad and with families. It was the initial travel bug that the girls caught as part of the Explorers that led to their desire to take on world travel without fear.

Is there any particular trip that stands out in your mind?

The trip that most stands out for me is our trip to Niagara Falls. For me, it was a pivotal point in my life as it came full circle. When I was in the 5th grade, my elementary school teacher took five students to Niagara Falls. It was the first time I had been outside my city! To me, it was like entering another world as I heard people speaking French. Me being able to take girls to a place where I first discovered a new world was surreal. I know many of those girls on the trip had never been to Niagara Falls. To visit a country (near, yet so far) with 25 of their fellow Explorers was more than words can describe.

How has traveling impacted the lives of Club members?

Many of our original Explorers are constantly on a plane headed somewhere. Many have shared of their stories to distant lands; many of which we studied in our organization together. One student mentioned how the game we play to recognize 20 world landmarks in no longer a game, but a goal. I thought that was so profound and smile each time I think about it. 

What has been the biggest impact on you since the Merze Tate Explorers' Club was founded?

I feel the biggest impact on me since the founding of the organization in 2008, was having people reach out to us to interview famous authors, astronauts, ambassadors, and other amazing women leaders in the corporate world. What once seemed like a challenge to get across the importance of exposing girls to the world as travel writers, has come clear for so many…so many in fact that we are being sought out to meet women who are role models. 

How is the Merze Tate Explorer’s Club funded? What would you say to convince a potential donor to support the Club?

When the organization began, it was a grassroots effort. We asked for mostly in-kind support for travel, food, materials, etc. Our first big grant was received in 2009 when the Kalamazoo Community Foundation awarded us $2,000 through a fiduciary. In 2015 we became an official nonprofit. My background as a journalist has helped secure many grants and donations from those who have been inspired by our mission to expose girls to possibilities. 

Is there anything else you’d like to mention?

This has been an amazing journey. As I looked at an exhibit we created to celebrate our 10 years, I couldn’t help but think of all the challenges along the way. However, looking at the smiling faces in the photographs, faces that didn’t care how small of a budget we had, I am glad I obeyed the call from God to create the Merze Tate Explorers. Had I disobeyed that call, so many lives would have been effected. Now, so many lives have changed in so many ways. 

For more information on the Merze Tate Explorers and to make a donation, click here.

Photo Credits: Sonya Hollins