Sigma Gamma Rho Sorority, Inc. was founded on November 12, 1922, in Indianapolis, Indiana by seven young African American school teachers. Sigma Gamma Rho’s founders are Nannie Mae Gahn Johnson, Mary Lou Allison Little, Vivian White Marbury, Bessie M. Downey Martin, Cubena McClure, Hattie Mae Dulin Redford, and Dorothy Hanley Whiteside. On December 30, 1929, a charter was granted to the Alpha chapter at Butler University making the organization a national college sorority.
Edna Mae Douglas was a charter member of Sigma Gamma Rho’s Theta Sigma chapter in Little Rock, Arkansas. She served as Second Grand Anti-Basileus from 1948-52 and First Grand Anti-Basileus from 1952-54. She was the organization’s eighth Grand Basileus and her tenure spanned from 1954 until 1959.
Douglas graduated from Arkansas Agricultural, Mechanical and Normal College, now the University of Arkansas at Pine Bluff. Her Master’s was earned at Atlanta University. She taught and was chairman of the science department at Paul Dunbar High School in Little Rock, Arkansas.
During the 1952-53 year she was the winner of the first Ford Foundation Fellowship offered by the Little Rock Public Schools. She spent a year in travel as part of the fellowship. In 1953 Sigma Gamma Rho named her the winner of the Blanche Edwards Award, its highest personal honor.
Douglas was on the Board of Directors of her Alma Mater, the only African American woman to serve in this way. A residence hall at the university is named in her honor.
She was active in the Little Rock community and served on the Board of Directors of the Greater Little Rock YWCA. Douglas also served as President of the National Pan-Hellenic Council, Inc. from 1960-62.
The Theta Sigma chapter of Sigma Gamma Rho hosts a Edna M. Douglas Scholarship Luncheon each year.
