Continuing Research
Delores C. Hunt, Ed.D.
From 1970 to 1980, Delores Cawthon Hunt, Ed.D, became the first African American female to Serve on the Anne Arundel County, Maryland, Board of Education. She served two five-year term appointments.
Dr. Hunt was appointed to the Board of Education by the former Governor of Maryland, Marvin Mandel. As the lone African American during her tenure, she had the reputation of being a gutsy person who was not afraid to speak her mind. Called “the elder statesman” of the school board, she was a champion of equality for both the educational rights of African American students and the rights of their parents.
Delores was born in Blakely, Early County, Georgia on July 28, 1909. She was one of four girls and two boys in the Cawthon family, who lived in a farming community. In a 1980 interview for the Baltimore Sun newspaper, she recalled, “I remember my mother huddling us in the house when the Klan would ride and bolting all the doors and windows, and we would worry about my father, somewhere in the darkness, and trying to make it home.”
At the age of 13, she moved to Baltimore to live with an aunt so she could get medical treatment for a bone disorder in her leg and pelvis. “In Georgia, there was no hospital of high competency where blacks could go for treatment,” she said in the Sun interview. She spent many periods of time in the Baltimore hospitals having multiple surgeries but continued her studies.
Delores graduated as valedictorian from Frederick Douglass High School in Baltimore; she then attended Coppin Normal School where she graduated with a teaching diploma. During her years as a Baltimore teacher, educator, and principal she earned a bachelor’s degree from Morgan, a master’s degree from New York University, and a Doctorate in Education from the University of Pennsylvania.
Hunt moved to the northern part of Anne Arundel County in the 1960s and became interested in the County’s public education system. By 1970 she was appointed to the Anne Arundel County School Board where she advocated for the rights of African Americans to get a good basic education. In 1979 she was appointed vice chairman of the State Advisory Council on Vocational-Technical Education.
During her lifetime, in addition to her role as a school board member, she was also a member of the Anne Arundel County League of Human Rights, Provident Hospital Board of Trustees, Coppin State Board of Visitors, and the Governor’s Committee on Recreation. She was also a co-founder of the South Baltimore Federal Credit Union, and in her later years, she joined Mt.Moriah A.M.E. Church in Annapolis.
Hunt was married to the late Dr. Richard H. Hunt, a physician. She died at home on December 26, 2007, at the age of 98, leaving behind a trailblazing legacy as a champion of education and human rights.