Lemoine DeLeaver Pierce papers

1934

Lemoine Alease DeLeaver born in Harlem Hospital (New York, N.Y.), to John Abner and Flossie Alice DeLeaver

1951

Graduated from Lincoln Park Honor School of the High School of Commerce

1952

Married William Joseph Pierce (1928-1993)

1954

Son, William Joseph "Billy" Pierce III, born

1955

Graduated with honors from Brooklyn College (New York, N.Y.), B.S. in Education

1955-1959

Worked as a teacher and guidance counselor at PS 175 in Harlem, New York

1957

Daughter, Leslie Nona Pierce, born

1963

Graduated from Hunter College (New York, N.Y.), M.Ed in Educational Counseling

1965-1968

Guidance counselor, Hunter College High School for the Gifted

1966-1975

Married Eugene Callender

1968-1971

Assistant to the Dean of Faculty, Barnard College, Columbia University (New York, N.Y.)

1973-1980

Guidance counselor, New York City Board of Education

1976-1980

English instructor, Berlitz School of Languages (New York, N.Y.)

1980

Graduated, Rutgers University School of Law (Newark, N.J.), Juris Doctor

1981-1984

Director, Berlitz School of Languages (Baltimore, Md.)

1983

Toured Egypt with Dr. Yosef ben-Jochannan

1984-1990

District Director, Berlitz School of Languages (Boston, Mass.)

1987

Received Certificate of Special Studies in Administration and Management, Harvard University (Boston, Mass.)

1990

Senior Associate, D.J. Miller & Associates (Atlanta, Ga.)

1990-present

Commercial Arbitrator, American Arbitration Association (Atlanta, Ga)

1993-1999

Director, School of Dispute Resolution (Atlanta, Ga.)

1993

Delegate, People's Republic of China, People-To-People Organization

1996-2003

Associate Professor of Legal Studies, Morris Brown College (Atlanta, Ga.)

1996-2003

Arbitrator, National Association of Securities Dealers

1997

Delegate, South Africa, People-To-People Organization

1998

Studied Art History, School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London

1998-2002

Instructor of Business Law and Labor Relations, Keller Graduate School of Management

2000-2006

Attended the Graduate School of Art and Design, Georgia State University, in Art History

2003-present

Instructor, Mack J. Robinson College of Business, Georgia State University (Atlanta, Ga.)

2002-2005

Adjunct Professor of Political Science, Clark Atlanta University (Atlanta, Ga.)

2013

Died

2002

Delegate, Cuba, People-To-People Organization

Study Abroad Program, University of Havana (Cuba), co-sponsored by Georgia State University

Lemoine Alease DeLeaver Pierce was born on September 2, 1934, the eldest of three children of John Abner DeLeaver of White Stone, Virginia and Flossie Alice White of Kilmarnock, Virginia. Pierce spent a great deal of time with her maternal grandparents, Alice Roberta and Luther Doggett White on their 48 acre Kilmarnock farm in Lancaster County, Virginia. Her grandparents, denied a formal education, ensured that their children had this opportunity. At a time when the Virginia public school system limited African-American children to a sixth grade education, the White’s sent their 6 children out of state to attend Dunbar High School (also known as the M Street School) in Washington, D.C., one of the few black high schools in the country.

Pierce grew up in Harlem. The DeLeaver family was among the first to live in the Harlem River Houses in upper Manhattan, one of the first public housing projects in the nation. They attended Abyssinian Baptist Church, where Pierce sang in the choir. At age 9, she was baptized by the pastor, Adam Clayton Powell, Jr. who was later elected to represent the Harlem community in the United States Congress.

Pierce attended P.S. 46 in Manhattan, Edward W. Stitt Junior High School 164, and the Lincoln Park Honor School of the High School of Commerce in New York. She graduated from Brooklyn College and Hunter College in New York with a B.A. and M.S. degrees in Education in 1955 and 1963, respectively. She went on to earn a Juris Doctorate degree from Rutgers University School of Law in Newark in 1980. She received a post graduate certificate in management and administration from Harvard University in 1988. A lifelong learner, Pierce studied Asian and Hispanic art history at the graduate school of Georgia State University, and African art at Emory University and the University of London’s School of Oriental and African Studies.

Pierce's educational pursuits extend beyond the formal classroom, particularly her studies in African world history. Early exposure to Africa was provided when as a child her paternal aunt, Dorothy DeLeaver Gibrilla, who was from the small town of White Stone, Virginia, married Claudius Adelejou Gibrilla of Sierra Leone, West Africa in 1937. When his country declared independence from Britain, Claude Gibrilla was named Consul General for New York. Pierce developed an appreciation of African-Americans relationship to Africa through her frequent interactions with the Gibrillas. Mrs. Gibrilla gave Pierce the Yoruba name Modupe, meaning “I give thanks to God for watching over me.”

Pierce furthered her education in African world history in Harlem while working at the Liberation Bookstore, owned by Una Mulzac, daughter of the captain of Marcus Garvey's ship, The Black Star Line. This bookstore was the primary source for books that were included the curriculum for the newly formed Black Studies departments in colleges across the country. Pierce read these books while filling the purchase orders that were received. She also benefited from the tutelage of Harlem based historian John Henrik Clarke and Egyptologist Dr. Yosef ben Jochannan. In 1977 the First World Alliance (a Harlem study group that she belonged to) began a weekly lecture series on African world history, where Clarke and ben Jochannan regularly lectured. In 1983 Pierce traveled with Dr. ben Jochannan on a study tour of Egypt. In 1992 he wrote the introduction to her book, Selected Bibliography of African World History. From 1993-2002 she participated in a series of study abroad professional exchange programs that took her to China, post-apartheid South Africa, and the Republic of Cuba; where she studied non-Western systems of conflict resolution.

Influenced by family role models, Pierce began her professional career in 1955 as an elementary school teacher and guidance counselor in Harlem public schools. In 1965, upon completing her master’s degree in educational counseling, she was recruited by Hunter College High School for the Gifted to assist them in the integration of larger numbers of black students into that exclusive institution. In 1968 she resigned her position at Hunter to accept a position of Assistant to the Dean of the Faculty at Barnard College, the elite women’s college at Columbia University in New York. Pressured by the civil rights movement, Barnard was faced with the need to enroll a more diverse student body at this Ivy League institution. To assist them with this campus-wide transition, Pierce became the first Black administrator at the College. During her 3 year tenure she negotiated a landmark, peer enforced drug-free policy for Black students at this institution. Black women enrolled at Barnard organized under the name of Barnard Organization of Soul Sisters (B.O.S.S.) and became the first organized group of black students at a “Seven Sisters” Ivy League college. B.O.S.S. urged the college to develop a more culturally inclusive curriculum. Pierce coordinated supportive services for these women, and for faculty, and carefully documented the evolution of B.O.S.S, developing lasting friendships with many of the students. Among the many talented women attending Barnard at the time were author Thulani Davis and acclaimed playwright Ntozake Shange (Paulette Williams).

After her resignation from Barnard in 1971, Pierce renewed her guidance counselor license and returned briefly to the Harlem public schools. In 1976, she began what would become a long term association with the Berlitz School of Languages, the world’s premier provider of foreign language services. Pierce began as an instructor at the Berlitz Center located near the United Nations headquarters on New York’s east side; where she gave private English lessons to foreign executives. In 1981 she was recruited as a Berlitz management trainee and was assigned to manage Berlitz operations in Baltimore, Maryland. In 1984 she was promoted to District Director of the New England Region (based in Boston) where she was responsible for sales, operations, human resources and the management of a Fortune 500 corporate client portfolio for Berlitz in four states.

In 1990, Lemoine Pierce was recruited as a Senior Associate by D.J. Miller & Associates (DJMA) a management consulting firm, and relocated to Atlanta. The principals in this firm (including Clara Axam, a former student leader of B.O.S.S at Barnard College) had all been part of Atlanta Mayor’s Maynard Jackson’s staff in 1973 when he launched his Minority Business Enterprise (MBWE) program. MBWE required that all contractors doing business with the City of Atlanta in the future would have to demonstrate that a percentage of the work would be done by teams that included women and minority contractors. This affirmative action municipal government contracting program (the first in United States history) became the model throughout the country. However, in 1989, the program was successfully challenged and deemed unconstitutional in a United States Supreme Court case, Croson v. City of Richmond. Cities throughout the nation were subsequently required to conduct disparity studies to provide proof of past societal discrimination in the construction industry that would justify the need for MBWE programs. Because of this experience with Maynard Jackson, DJMA was the national expert on the design and implementation of disparity studies. Pierce was assigned to research and write portions of several of the firm’s disparity studies.

Following upon her work at DJMA, and her involvement with the development of Alternative Dispute Resolution (ADR) programs in Georgia and throughout the United States, Pierce was recruited as an instructor by Morris Brown College. In 1996 she became as full-time professor in their newly formed Legal Studies program, the first such degree granting program for undergraduates at an historically black college. She was tenured as an Associate Professor of Legal Studies, was highly regarded by her students, and listed in Who’s Who Among America’s Teachers. She died on October 5, 2013.