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92_SR0464
LRB9217374BHbh
1 SENATE RESOLUTION
2 WHEREAS, The members of the Illinois Senate are saddened
3 to learn of the death of Dr. Arnita Young Boswell, formerly
4 of Chicago, who passed away July 6, 2002, in Los Angeles,
5 California; and
6 WHEREAS, When Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. led a massive
7 civil rights demonstration in Chicago in the summer of 1966,
8 Arnita Young Boswell directed the women's division of the
9 march; and
10 WHEREAS, Dr. Boswell was a social worker, university
11 professor, and titan in Chicago's social justice arena who
12 helped found the National Hook-Up of Black Women and the
13 League of Black Women; and
14 WHEREAS, The sister of the late Whitney M. Young Jr., a
15 civil rights leader who was executive director of the
16 National Urban League, Dr. Boswell shared her brother's
17 passion for social justice for prisoners, children, senior
18 citizens, women, Native Americans and many others; and
19 WHEREAS, Dr. Boswell was born in Detroit, and her family
20 moved to the campus of the Lincoln Institute of Kentucky,
21 where her father, Whitney M. Young Sr., taught and was a
22 principal; her mother, Laura, was among the first black
23 female postmasters in the United States; and
24 WHEREAS, Dr. Boswell earned a degree in home economics
25 from Kentucky State University in 1943 and a graduate degree
26 in social work from Atlanta University in Georgia; during
27 World War II she joined the American Red Cross, serving as a
28 recreation director for soldiers stationed in Germany; and
29 WHEREAS, On her return, she became a social worker with
30 the Red Cross and was trained to fly by a Tuskegee Airman at
31 Fisk University in Tennessee, where she met her first
-2- LRB9217374BHbh
1 husband, William Yancy Bell Jr.; in the mid-1950s, she
2 married Dr. Paul Boswell, a dermatologist; and
3 WHEREAS, Dr. Boswell taught social work for 19 years at
4 the University of Chicago and later was director of social
5 services at the University of Illinois at Chicago; in the
6 mid-1980s she began work as manager of the Family Resource
7 Center in the city's Department of Human Services; and
8 WHEREAS, Dr. Boswell's organization, the National Hook-Up
9 of Black Women, was a support base for black female
10 activists; she also founded the Chicago-based consulting firm
11 Boswell-Young & Associates, and her memberships included the
12 Urban League Women's Board, the Alpha Gamma Pi sorority and
13 Protestants for the Common Good; and
14 WHEREAS, Dr. Arnita Boswell is survived by her daughter,
15 Bonnie (husband, Roderick) Hamilton; her sister, Eleanor
16 Love; and her two grandsons; therefore, be it
17 RESOLVED, BY THE SENATE OF THE NINETY-SECOND GENERAL
18 ASSEMBLY OF THE STATE OF ILLINOIS, that we mourn, along with
19 all who knew her, the death of Dr. Arnita Boswell formerly of
20 Chicago; and be it further
21 RESOLVED, That a suitable copy of this resolution be
22 presented to the family of Dr. Arnita Boswell with our
23 sincere condolences.