Olivia Ward Bush-Banks (née Olivia Ward; February 27, 1869 – April 8, 1944) was an American author, poet and journalist of African-American and Montaukett Native American heritage. Ward celebrated both of her heritages in her poetry and writing. She was a regular contributor to the Colored American magazine and wrote a column for the New Rochelle, New York publication, the Westchester Record-Courier.

Early life and education

Born February 27, 1869, in Sag Harbor, Long Island, New York, Ward was the third of three daughters of Eliza Draper and Abraham Ward, her mother was of African-American and Montaukett descent, her father was of Portuguese, East Indian, and African descent. Ward's mother died when she was about nine months old, and her father moved with the family to Providence, Rhode Island. When her father remarried there, he gave young Olivia to her mother's sister Maria Draper for care, who reared Olivia as her own. She attended local schools in Providence, and studied nursing in high school. She also became interested in drama and poetry.

Marriage and family

In 1889, Ward married Frank Bush. The couple had two daughters, Rosamund and Maria.

Career

thumb|Olivia Ward Bush-Banks, c. 1920

Ward found work at times in either Providence and Boston, whatever she could find to support her family. This was her most popular volume.

By 1918 or so, Ward had moved to Chicago, Illinois, with her second husband Anthony Banks, whose job with the Pullman Company was based there. She wrote her first play, Indian Trails: or Trail of the Montauk; as it survives only in fragments, scholars estimate a date of 1920. After that, she turned more of her writing to the African-American experience. Chicago was becoming an important urban center of black life, music and culture during the Great Migration, as tens of thousands of blacks left the rural South and moved to northern industrial cities.

Ward became a regular contributor to Colored American magazine and a strong supporter of the "New Negro Movement." She helped sculptor Richmond Barthé and writer Langston Hughes get their starts during the Harlem Renaissance. Ward expressed her passion about the struggles of African Americans and the need for social change through her writing. She also demonstrated her faith in God through her words.

The Banks established and ran the Bush-Banks School of Expression in Chicago, which became a place for black artists to gather and nurture their art. She also served as an Urban League Volunteer in Chicago, Illinois oftentimes working with children of the Farren School. In addition to this, Olivia Ward Bush Banks was a member of the Red Cap's Literary Club where she led and delivered an address in the summer of 1924.

References

Further reading

  • Bernice Forrest (formerly Bernice Forrest Guillaume), ed. The Collected Works of Olivia Ward Bush-Banks, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1991
  • "Bush-Banks, Olivia Ward", American National Biography Online, Wright University
  • Original Poems by Olivia Bush (aka Olivia Ward Bush-Banks) (1869–1944). Providence, RI: Louis A. Basinet Press, 1899; Reprinted in The Collected Works of Olivia Ward Bush-Banks, compiled and edited by Bernice Forrest (formerly Bernice Forrest Guillaume), Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1991 at A Celebration of Women Writers
  • "Olivia Ward Bush" , Featured Praying Poet, Christian Poets