Mary McLeod Bethune was born #OnThisDay July 10, 1875, in Mayesville, South Carolina, the fifteenth of seventeen children born to parents who had been enslaved. Eight of her older siblings were born into slavery. The family managed to purchase five acres of land from their former enslavers, which helped the household financially. Bethune was the only one of her siblings to receive an education, inspired by her teachers to one day open her own school focusing on empowering Black women. In 1898, s