WILMINGTON, NC – Bertha Boykin Todd, a retired educator and lifelong activist for racial justice and reconciliation, will be honored with the Wilmington Rotary Club’s first Legacy Award. This honor was created to recognize people who have made major contributions, over many years, to improving the quality of life in Wilmington and New Hanover County.
The award will be presented on May 1 at the Rotary Club’s third annual Leaders in Service Banquet. Todd will receive the Legacy Award alongside this year’s three Leaders in Service honorees. Leaders in Service recognizes leaders in the private, non-profit, and public sectors who are making Wilmington a better place to live, work, and raise a family.
Between 1952 and 1968, Bertha Todd was a librarian at the all-Black Williston High School. When New Hanover County Schools were desegregated and Williston closed, she was assigned to the new Hoggard High School. There, she helped students navigate the turmoil and violence that followed desegregation from 1968 through 1971.
She soon became an assistant principal and held that position until retiring in 1992. A member of local and state human relations boards, she advised mayors, superintendents, and governors. She was co-chair of the 1898 Centennial Foundation, which remembered the white supremacist insurrection that overturned Wilmington’s bi-racial city government, forcibly exiled leading Black citizens, and largely destroyed a thriving Black business community. Todd drafted the Foundation’s statement of philosophy, which said all of Wilmington’s residents shared the responsibility to understand our city’s history and “to make our community one where economic justice and racial harmony flourish.” After 1998, she worked to create a memorial to the 1898 insurrection, which now stands on North Third Street.
The long list of her other honors includes: the National Organization for Women’s Susan B. Anthony Award, 1980; the Order of the Long Leaf Pine, bestowed by the governor of North Carolina, 1984; the YWCA Lifetime Achievement Award and the Baha’i Human Rights Award, both in 1985; a UNCW honorary doctorate of humanities, 2000; and the Star-News Lifetime Achievement Award, 2004.
In recommending Todd for the Legacy Award, the Rotary Club’s Leaders in Service committee stated, “We strongly believe that Bertha has lived a life that fully embraces the behaviors identified in the Four-Way Test, has clearly demonstrated significant courage to defend these principles, and maintained a constructive approach to address the need for racial equality.” The Four-Way Test is Rotary International’s guide for its members, requiring honesty, fairness, goodwill and friendship, and mutual benefit.
The others to be honored at the Leaders in Service banquet have made outstanding contributions to the community in one or more of the seven Rotary Areas of Focus. They have also led their lives and conducted their business in harmony with the Four-Way Test and have demonstrated a commitment to diversity, equity, and inclusion. The websites wilmingtonrotaryclub.org and leadersinservice.org have more information about Rotary’s goals. The Leaders in Service honorees are:
Public sector: Dr. Charles Hardy was the founding dean of UNC-Wilmington’s College of Health and Human Services, established in 2010. His award recognizes his years of effort to increase the number of health professionals available to work in New Hanover County and in the broader region. His award reflects accomplishments toward three of Rotary International’s areas of focus: disease prevention and treatment, maternal and child health, and economic and community development.
Private sector: Brian McMerty, a managing partner of the executive-search firm Arris Partners, helped lead the merger that created the Boys & Girls Club of Southeastern N.C., overcoming a century-long racial divide between the two organizations. He established the Men on a Mission volunteer group at Wilmington’s St. James Episcopal Church. He and his wife have conserved environmentally sensitive sites through groups including the Coastal Land Trust. His award recognizes his support of several of the Rotary areas of focus: health, education, economic development, and the environment.
Non-profit sector: Connie Parker founded Wilmington Health Access for Teens in 1995, and was its executive director through 2005. She is now director “emeritus” status. She is also devoted to restoring Wilmington’s tree canopy. She founded the Alliance for Cape Fear Trees and serves as its president and acting executive director. Her Leaders in Service award recognizes her work toward Rotary’s areas of focus on maternal and child health, economic and community development, and the environment.
The Wilmington Rotary Club, founded in 1915, is one of the oldest of the world-wide Rotary movement’s more than 35,000 clubs. The club’s 160 current members are among some 1.4 million Rotarians around the globe. Rotary began as a business networking group but almost immediately evolved into a service organization as it grew and spread. With the motto “Service Above Self,” Rotary espouses the Four-Way Test of the things its members think, say, and do:
- Is it the truth?
- Is it fair to all concerned?
- Will it build good will and better friendships?
- Will it be beneficial to all concerned?
Rotary International has chosen to concentrate its service efforts on seven Areas of Rotary Focus:
- Peace and conflict prevention/resolution.
- Disease prevention and treatment.
- Water and sanitation.
- Maternal and child health.
- Basic education and literacy.
- Economic and community development.
- The environment.
Rotary has also made a global commitment to diversity, equity, and inclusion in its membership.
