Logan, Adella Hunt, 1863-1915

Adella Hunt Logan (February 10, 1863 – December 10, 1915) was an African-American writer, educator, administrator and suffragist. Born during the Civil War, she earned her teaching credentials at Atlanta University, an historically black college founded by the American Missionary Association. She became a teacher at the Tuskegee Institute and became an activist for education and suffrage for women of color. As part of her advocacy, she published articles in some of the most noted black periodicals of her time.

Hunt Logan is best known for her activist work. Her main interest was education advocacy, seen especially in her work at Tuskegee. In 1895, Hunt Logan joined the Tuskegee Woman's Club, which became an affiliate of the National Association of Colored Women (NACW) a year later. The Tuskegee chapter worked to improve the lives of African Americans in local communities. Hunt Logan worked specifically in programs aimed to improve health care, as well as advocating for prison reform and running a lending library as a member of the NACW club.

One of Hunt Logan's educational goals was to prepare individuals for universal suffrage. In 1895 the National American Woman Suffrage Association (NAWSA) held a convention in Atlanta. Due to the difficulty NAWSA was having gaining passage for a constitutional amendment on women's suffrage, the organization was looking for support from southern states. Although NAWSA was appealed to white southerners, it observed state Jim Crow segregation and turned away African-American women and men from the convention. Mississippi had already passed a new constitution to disenfranchise blacks, and other southern states completed similar actions in this period, through 1908. This was the atmosphere in which Hunt Logan arrived at the convention. Hunt Logan was able to hear Susan B. Anthony speak, and despite the racism which she and other African Americans had to contend with at the convention, Hunt Logan became a member of the NAWSA after being inspired by Anthony's speech.

Hunt Logan campaigned for women's suffrage in Alabama and wrote for NAWSA's newspaper, The Woman's Journal. In September 1912, Hunt Logan contributed an article to the magazine of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), The Crisis, as a part of a special issue on women's suffrage. She argued for the right to vote, specifically for women of color. She pointed to the success of women's voting in many western states that had statewide suffrage and argued,
...the colored American believes in equal justice to all, regardless of race, color, creed or sex, and longs for the day when the United States shall indeed have a government of the people, for the people and by the people—even including the colored people.

On December 12, 1915 Adella Hunt Logan passed away in Tuskegee, Alabama at the age of 52.