Thelma Edna Berlack Boozer was born in Florida on September 26, 1906. In 1920, she moved to New York and attended Theodore Roosevelt High School in the Bronx. She graduated with highest honors in 1924. As a school reporter for the now defunct New York World, she entered its “Biggest News of the Week” competition. She earned a $50 bonus as well as a $20 cash prize. That $70 prize is equivalent to more than $1,000 in 2020 money. In addition to her writing skills, she was an accomplished speaker. She won a $50 award representing her high school in a national oratorical contest sponsored by the New York Times.
As a New York University student, she became a member of the Lambda chapter of Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority, Incorporated. The chapter began as an undergraduate and graduate chapter serving New York City colleges and universities. It became an undergraduate chapter in 1925, when its graduate chapter, Tau Omega, was formed.
As a freshman and sophomore, she was the New York society reporter for the Pittsburgh Courier, a black newspaper that had both national and local editions. Her column, Chatter and Chimes, started in the New York edition of the paper.
After her stepfather died in 1926, the family’s financial situation changed and she faced a dilemma. She took a full-time job with the New York Amsterdam News and she took courses at night, keeping up a schedule to graduate on time in 1928. Three weeks after she started at the paper, she became its assistant managing editor. After earning her undergraduate degree, she began a graduate work at NYU.
During this time of working and studying for a Master’s degree, she served a year as Editor of The Ivy Leaf, the sorority’s magazine. She married James C. Boozer in 1930. He worked for the United States Postal Service. Boozer finished her coursework and wrote her thesis on The Evolution of Negro Journalism in the United States.
From 1929 until 1935, she served her sorority as Director of the North Atlantic region. She was chair of Alpha Kappa Alpha’s 17th Boulé in New York City from December 26-29, 1934. A novel event which she coordinated took place on the morning of December 30. It was a coast-to-coast radio program recorded at the NBC Studios in Radio City. Among the 300 people who witnessed the stage presentation was sorority founder Ethel Hedgeman Lyle. The audio part of the 30-minute program was aired on WJZ. Among the performers was Etta Motten.
Boozer continued working for New York Amsterdam News. She was on the board of the Harlem Newspaper Club when it was founded in 1932. Barbara, the first of the Boozers’ two daughters, was born in 1937. The following year, Omega Psi Phi Fraternity awarded Boozer its achievement medal in journalism. She was also honored with the Brooklyn Women’s Service League’s World’s Fair Medal in journalism.
The January 3, 1942 edition of the Pittsburgh Courier reported on a banquet at the Grand Street Boys’ Association which was “crowded to capacity by more than 400 diners who had paid $1.50 apiece to give visible and oral testimony of their appreciation.” Boozer, “TEB as she is affectionately known,” was leaving Harlem for Jefferson City, Missouri. After 15 years at the newspaper, she was to be on the faculty of the journalism school which was to open at Lincoln University.
The report of her going away event told that “her proudest moment was perhaps the recent occasion when she was recalled to the Theodore Roosevelt High School to address the two senior assemblies. This marked the first time that any graduate has ever been asked to return to the school.”
Boozer left Missouri and returned east. Her daughter Thelma was born in 1946 in New York City. Boozer took on writing jobs and served as Assistant Managing Editor of the New York Age.
Mayor Robert F. Wagner appointed her to do public relations work in the Office of the Borough President of Manhattan in 1950. The New York branch of the National Association of Negro Business and Professional Womens’ Club awarded her its Sojourner Truth Award in 1954.
She spoke at the Barber-Scotia College Club Founders’ Day event in 1959. It took place at Rendall Memorial Presbyterian Church in Harlem. Boozer “received her heartiest applause when she reminded her audience that we cannot turn a blind eye or deaf ear to our New York City schools while we fight for integration in Little Rock and Virginia.”
Boozer continued to work for the city in various capacities utilizing her journalistic talents until she retired in 1973. Her oral history interview in 1981 is part of Columbia University’s United Negro College Fund project. She was 94 years old when she died in 2001.
The Tau Omega Chapter of Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority awards the Thelma Berlack Boozer Scholarship for Academic Excellence.
