Marjorie Penney
Permanent ID:
451Date:
circa 1946Image Description:
Marjorie Penney (1908-1983) was one of two recipients of the Philadelphia Award for 1946. (Maurice B. Fagan was her co-recipient.) Penney founded the Young People’s Interracial Fellowship Committee in Philadelphia in 1931, which ten years later developed into the Fellowship House. Under Penney’s direction, the Fellowship offered programs and services, both religious and social, to adults and school-age children to promote tolerance and understanding of different faiths and races. It became active in national anti-lynching legislation in the 1930s and in local integrated housing and recreational facilities during the 1950s. In the early 1960s, it sponsored fellowship clubs in the public schools. In later years, the Fellowship took on other issues of intolerance; namely homophobia, sexism and discrimination against the handicap.Penney put the money she received from the Philadelphia Award toward the purchase of a 120-acre farm in Pottstown, Montgomery County, Pennsylvania, in 1951. The farm became the Fellowship House headquarters in 1973, as all city properties were sold (the last Fellowship House in Philadelphia was located at 1710 N. 27 Street.) Penney retired as director in 1968. Operating as Fellowship Farm, Penney’s vision continues to this day.