A'Lelia Bundles
Encyclopedia
A'Lelia Bundles is an African American journalist.
in a family of civic minded business executives. Her great-great-grandmother was the hair care entrepreneur Madam C. J. Walker (1867–1919), and her great-grandmother and namesake was A'Lelia Walker
(1885–1931), a central figure of the Harlem Renaissance
. Her mother, A'Lelia Mae Perry Bundles (1928–1976), who was vice president of the Madam C. J. Walker Manufacturing Company and active in local and state Democratic politics, also served as a member of the Washington Township School Board and was a fiscal administrator with the City of Indianapolis. Her father, S. Henry Bundles, Jr. (1927-), became president of Summit Laboratories, another hair care manufacturer, in 1957 after having worked briefly with the Walker Company. He served as an Indianapolis 500 Festival director for many years and was a board member of the Indianapolis Convention and Visitors Bureau.
Bundles graduated in 1970 in the top five per cent of her class from North Central High School where she was co-editor of the Northern Lights, vice president of student council and co-chair and founder of the human relations council that addressed racial issues in a school with a student population that was less than ten percent black. In 1974 Bundles graduated magna cum laude from Radcliffe College
. She was inducted into Harvard's Alpha Iota chapter of Phi Beta Kappa. Bundles received a master's degree from the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism
in 1976.
, having served as director of talent development in Washington, DC and New York, as well as in the position of deputy bureau chief in Washington, DC, as a producer for World News Tonight with Peter Jennings and as chair of a diversity council appointed to advise ABC News president David Westin. Prior to joining ABC News, she was a producer with NBC News
in the New York, Houston and Atlanta bureaus for The Today Show
and NBC Nightly News with Tom Brokaw. She also was a producer in Washington, DC for two of NBC's magazine programs co-anchored by Connie Chung
and Roger Mudd
during the 1980s.
Her book, On Her Own Ground: The Life and Times of Madam C. J. Walker (Scribner, 2001), was named a New York Times Notable Book in 2001, a 2002 Hurston/Wright Foundation-Borders Books Legacy Award finalist and received the Association of Black Women Historians 2001 Letitia Woods Brown Prize for the best book on black women's history. Her young adult biography, Madam C. J. Walker: Entrepreneur (Chelsea House, 1991) received a 1992 American Book Award
from the Before Columbus Foundation
and was named one of Best Books for the Teenage by the New York Public Library
in 1991.
A frequent public speaker, Bundles has made presentations about Madam Walker, A'Lelia Walker, the Harlem Renaissance, television journalism, women's history, African American history, entrepreneurship, financial literacy and philanthropy
at conferences, universities and institutions ranging from Harvard University's Business School, London City Hall, the Israeli Presidential Conference and Bedford Hills Correctional Facility for Women to the U. S. Embassy in Riga, Latvia, the National Association of Women Business Owners
, the Center on Philanthropy at Indiana University and Spelman College
. In 2010 she participated in a Teaching American History Grant panel for Flint, Michigan social studies teachers with Nettie Washington Douglass (a descendant of Frederick Douglass
and Booker T. Washington
) and Michelle Duster (a great-granddaughter of journalist and activist Ida B. Wells
).
Her articles have appeared in the New York Times Book Review, O (The Oprah Magazine), Fortune Small Business, The Radcliffe Quarterly, Sage, Black Issues Book Review
and Ms. She has appeared on NBC's "Today," CBS's "Sunday Morning," ABC's "Good Morning America," NPR's "Fresh Air" and "Morning Edition with Bob Edwards," BBC, PBS, CNN, Chris Rock's "Good Hair" and numerous local television and radio programs.
She is a trustee of Columbia University and on the boards of the Foundation for the National Archives, the Madame Walker Theatre Center
in Indianapolis and the Friends of Woodlawn Cemetery in the Bronx.
She is a past member of the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study's advisory board, the Harvard Alumni Association nominating committee, the Harvard Club of Washington, DC board, the Radcliffe College Trustees Board and the National Women's Hall of Fame
board. She was president of the Radcliffe College Alumnae Association from 1999 to 2001 and chair of the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism's alumni advisory committee to re-vamp the school's alumni organization in 2006. She has served as a class marshal at all of her Harvard reunions since 1984. She has chaired the National Association of Black Journalists Authors Showcase and the ABWH's Letitia Woods Brown Book and Articles Prize Awards Committee. She is a juror for the duPont Awards at Columbia's Journalism School and also has served as a juror for the Robert F. Kennedy Awards in Broadcast Journalism.
Family and early life
Bundles grew up in IndianapolisIndianapolis, Indiana
Indianapolis is the capital of the U.S. state of Indiana, and the county seat of Marion County, Indiana. As of the 2010 United States Census, the city's population is 839,489. It is by far Indiana's largest city and, as of the 2010 U.S...
in a family of civic minded business executives. Her great-great-grandmother was the hair care entrepreneur Madam C. J. Walker (1867–1919), and her great-grandmother and namesake was A'Lelia Walker
A'Lelia Walker
A'Lelia Walker was an American businesswoman and patron of the arts. She was the daughter and only child of self-made millionaire Madam C.J. Walker.-Early life:...
(1885–1931), a central figure of the Harlem Renaissance
Harlem Renaissance
The Harlem Renaissance was a cultural movement that spanned the 1920s and 1930s. At the time, it was known as the "New Negro Movement", named after the 1925 anthology by Alain Locke...
. Her mother, A'Lelia Mae Perry Bundles (1928–1976), who was vice president of the Madam C. J. Walker Manufacturing Company and active in local and state Democratic politics, also served as a member of the Washington Township School Board and was a fiscal administrator with the City of Indianapolis. Her father, S. Henry Bundles, Jr. (1927-), became president of Summit Laboratories, another hair care manufacturer, in 1957 after having worked briefly with the Walker Company. He served as an Indianapolis 500 Festival director for many years and was a board member of the Indianapolis Convention and Visitors Bureau.
Bundles graduated in 1970 in the top five per cent of her class from North Central High School where she was co-editor of the Northern Lights, vice president of student council and co-chair and founder of the human relations council that addressed racial issues in a school with a student population that was less than ten percent black. In 1974 Bundles graduated magna cum laude from Radcliffe College
Radcliffe College
Radcliffe College was a women's liberal arts college in Cambridge, Massachusetts, and was the coordinate college for Harvard University. It was also one of the Seven Sisters colleges. Radcliffe College conferred joint Harvard-Radcliffe diplomas beginning in 1963 and a formal merger agreement with...
. She was inducted into Harvard's Alpha Iota chapter of Phi Beta Kappa. Bundles received a master's degree from the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism
Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism
The Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism is one of Columbia's graduate and professional schools. It offers three degree programs: Master of Science in journalism , Master of Arts in journalism and a Ph.D. in communications...
in 1976.
Career
She is a former producer and executive with ABC NewsABC News
ABC News is the news gathering and broadcasting division of American broadcast television network ABC, a subsidiary of The Walt Disney Company...
, having served as director of talent development in Washington, DC and New York, as well as in the position of deputy bureau chief in Washington, DC, as a producer for World News Tonight with Peter Jennings and as chair of a diversity council appointed to advise ABC News president David Westin. Prior to joining ABC News, she was a producer with NBC News
NBC News
NBC News is the news division of American television network NBC. It first started broadcasting in February 21, 1940. NBC Nightly News has aired from Studio 3B, located on floors 3 of the NBC Studios is the headquarters of the GE Building forms the centerpiece of 30th Rockefeller Center it is...
in the New York, Houston and Atlanta bureaus for The Today Show
The Today Show
Today is an iconic American morning news and talk show airing every morning on NBC. Debuting on January 14, 1952, it was the first of its genre on American television and in the world. The show is also the fourth-longest running American television series...
and NBC Nightly News with Tom Brokaw. She also was a producer in Washington, DC for two of NBC's magazine programs co-anchored by Connie Chung
Connie Chung
Connie Chung, full name: Constance Yu-Hwa Chung Povich is an American journalist who has been an anchor and reporter for the U.S. television news networks NBC, CBS, ABC, CNN, and MSNBC. Some of her more famous interview subjects include Claus von Bülow and U.S...
and Roger Mudd
Roger Mudd
Roger Mudd is a U.S. television journalist and broadcaster, most recently as the primary anchor for The History Channel. Previously, Mudd was weekend and weekday substitute anchor of CBS Evening News, co-anchor of the weekday NBC Nightly News, and hosted NBC's Meet the Press, and NBC's American...
during the 1980s.
Her book, On Her Own Ground: The Life and Times of Madam C. J. Walker (Scribner, 2001), was named a New York Times Notable Book in 2001, a 2002 Hurston/Wright Foundation-Borders Books Legacy Award finalist and received the Association of Black Women Historians 2001 Letitia Woods Brown Prize for the best book on black women's history. Her young adult biography, Madam C. J. Walker: Entrepreneur (Chelsea House, 1991) received a 1992 American Book Award
American Book Award
The American Book Award was established in 1978 by the Before Columbus Foundation. It seeks to recognize outstanding literary achievement by contemporary American authors, without restriction to race, sex, ethnic background, or genre...
from the Before Columbus Foundation
and was named one of Best Books for the Teenage by the New York Public Library
New York Public Library
The New York Public Library is the largest public library in North America and is one of the United States' most significant research libraries...
in 1991.
A frequent public speaker, Bundles has made presentations about Madam Walker, A'Lelia Walker, the Harlem Renaissance, television journalism, women's history, African American history, entrepreneurship, financial literacy and philanthropy
Philanthropy
Philanthropy etymologically means "the love of humanity"—love in the sense of caring for, nourishing, developing, or enhancing; humanity in the sense of "what it is to be human," or "human potential." In modern practical terms, it is "private initiatives for public good, focusing on quality of...
at conferences, universities and institutions ranging from Harvard University's Business School, London City Hall, the Israeli Presidential Conference and Bedford Hills Correctional Facility for Women to the U. S. Embassy in Riga, Latvia, the National Association of Women Business Owners
National Association of Women Business Owners
The National Association of Women Business Owners is an organization in the United States founded in 1975 that has the purpose of networking the approximately 10.6 million women-owned businesses so as to provide mutual support, share resources, and provide a single voice to help shape economic and...
, the Center on Philanthropy at Indiana University and Spelman College
Spelman College
Spelman College is a four-year liberal arts women's college located in Atlanta, Georgia, United States. The college is part of the Atlanta University Center academic consortium in Atlanta. Founded in 1881 as the Atlanta Baptist Female Seminary, Spelman was the first historically black female...
. In 2010 she participated in a Teaching American History Grant panel for Flint, Michigan social studies teachers with Nettie Washington Douglass (a descendant of Frederick Douglass
Frederick Douglass
Frederick Douglass was an American social reformer, orator, writer and statesman. After escaping from slavery, he became a leader of the abolitionist movement, gaining note for his dazzling oratory and incisive antislavery writing...
and Booker T. Washington
Booker T. Washington
Booker Taliaferro Washington was an American educator, author, orator, and political leader. He was the dominant figure in the African-American community in the United States from 1890 to 1915...
) and Michelle Duster (a great-granddaughter of journalist and activist Ida B. Wells
Ida B. Wells
Ida Bell Wells-Barnett was an African American journalist, newspaper editor and, with her husband, newspaper owner Ferdinand L. Barnett, an early leader in the civil rights movement. She documented lynching in the United States, showing how it was often a way to control or punish blacks who...
).
Her articles have appeared in the New York Times Book Review, O (The Oprah Magazine), Fortune Small Business, The Radcliffe Quarterly, Sage, Black Issues Book Review
Black Issues Book Review
Black Issues Book Review was a bimonthly magazine published in the U.S. in which books of interest to African-American readers were reviewed. It was published from 1999 through 2007....
and Ms. She has appeared on NBC's "Today," CBS's "Sunday Morning," ABC's "Good Morning America," NPR's "Fresh Air" and "Morning Edition with Bob Edwards," BBC, PBS, CNN, Chris Rock's "Good Hair" and numerous local television and radio programs.
She is a trustee of Columbia University and on the boards of the Foundation for the National Archives, the Madame Walker Theatre Center
Madame Walker Theatre Center
The historic Madame C.J. Walker Building, which houses the Madame Walker Theatre Center, has long symbolized the spirit of creativity and community pride in the City of Indianapolis. Named after America’s first self-made female millionaire, Madam C.J. Walker, the site represents the achievements,...
in Indianapolis and the Friends of Woodlawn Cemetery in the Bronx.
She is a past member of the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study's advisory board, the Harvard Alumni Association nominating committee, the Harvard Club of Washington, DC board, the Radcliffe College Trustees Board and the National Women's Hall of Fame
National Women's Hall of Fame
The National Women's Hall of Fame is an American institution. It was created in 1969 by a group of people in Seneca Falls, New York, the location of the 1848 Women's Rights Convention...
board. She was president of the Radcliffe College Alumnae Association from 1999 to 2001 and chair of the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism's alumni advisory committee to re-vamp the school's alumni organization in 2006. She has served as a class marshal at all of her Harvard reunions since 1984. She has chaired the National Association of Black Journalists Authors Showcase and the ABWH's Letitia Woods Brown Book and Articles Prize Awards Committee. She is a juror for the duPont Awards at Columbia's Journalism School and also has served as a juror for the Robert F. Kennedy Awards in Broadcast Journalism.
List of works
- On Her Own Ground: The Life and Times of Madam C. J. Walker (Scribner, 2001)
- Madam C. J. Walker: Entrepreneur (Chelsea House, 1991; revised 2008)
- "Madam C. J. Walker" and "A'Lelia Walker" entries in Henry Louis Gates and Evelyn Higginbotham's African American National Biography
- "Madam C. J. Walker" entry in Darlene Clark Hines's Black Women in America
Awards
- Emmy Award (NBC News)
- duPont Gold Baton (ABC News 1994)
- American Book AwardAmerican Book AwardThe American Book Award was established in 1978 by the Before Columbus Foundation. It seeks to recognize outstanding literary achievement by contemporary American authors, without restriction to race, sex, ethnic background, or genre...
1992 for Madam C. J. Walker: Entrepreneur (Chelsea House, 1991) - New York Times Notable Book for On Her Own Ground: The Life and Times of Madam C. J. Walker 2001
- Black Caucus of the American Library Association Honor Book 2002
- Letitia Woods Brown Book Prize from the Association of Black Women Historians 2001
- Hurston/Wright-Borders Books Legacy Award Finalist 2002
- Distinguished alumni awards from Harvard University, Radcliffe College (2004) and Columbia University (2007)
- Honorary doctorate, Indiana UniversityIndiana UniversityIndiana University is a multi-campus public university system in the state of Indiana, United States. Indiana University has a combined student body of more than 100,000 students, including approximately 42,000 students enrolled at the Indiana University Bloomington campus and approximately 37,000...
, 2003 - North Central High School Hall of Fame
- Black Memorabilia Hall of Fame