Selma Hortense Burke was a sculptor who crafted images in the likenesses of famed figures such as Booker T. Washington, Mary McLeod Bethune, and Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. among others. Ms. Burke’s most notable accomplishment by most accounts is a sculpture of President Franklin D. Roosevelt, which some say is the inspiration for the image found on the dime coin.
Burke was born December 31, 1900 in Moorsesville, N.C. as one of 10 children to her minister father and home maker mother. She attended what is now known as Winston-Salem University and graduates from the St. Agnes Nursing School in Raleigh, N.C. After moving to New York, Burke’s second marriage to Harlem Renaissance writer Claude McKay introduced her to the world of art and shifted her career focus.
The brief union to McKay led to Burke working with the Works Progress Administration and the Harlem Artists Guild while also teaching art to Harlem youth. (READ MORE)
