Josephine "Josie" Byrd
Building Community and Breaking Barriers
Born to a sharecropper’s family in the rural south, octogenarian and pioneer for the black community, Josephine “Josie” Byrd, has made Woonsocket her home and a better place for 65 years. As a teenage girl, “I wasn’t excited about coming to Woonsocket,” said Byrd. “I came here on January 1st, 1960 and there was snow on the ground. I had never seen snow like that before. Cold. I just got sick and didn’t want to get out of bed, I just wanted to stay under the covers. I didn’t even want to look at the snow. My brother-in-law brought myself and Jesse to school for the first day. I walked into the school and I saw nothing but white people. I had come from a segregated school in the South. We’re talking culture shock. But … I learned how to integrate because I did a spur-of-the-moment integration into the system. I’ve come a long way because now I see people. When I walked into that school that day, I didn’t see people. I saw white people. But today I see people. I see God’s rainbow that he hung in the sky, all the beautiful colors. It was by the grace of God that we did come to Rhode Island because in some of the other big cities, I probably would’ve got caught up not knowing which corner to turn on.”
When Byrd arrived, Woonsocket was noted for industrial manufacturing, and she worked making everything from pot scrubbers to tennis shoes to designer sneakers. In 1969 when the Uniroyal Footwear Company closed, Byrd received a severance allowance and the opportunity to go to a school of higher learning for retraining. That is how Byrd earned her business certificate. At that time, Black people were not allowed in the front office, and she persisted in seeking secretarial work when raising her family required that she go back to work in the mills. In 1974, Byrd was finally hired at A.T. Cross, advancing from clerk to secretary for the Quality Control Manager, a role she held for 23 years.
When Byrd arrived, Woonsocket was noted for industrial manufacturing, and she worked making everything from pot scrubbers to tennis shoes to designer sneakers. In 1969 when the Uniroyal Footwear Company closed, Byrd received a severance allowance and the opportunity to go to a school of higher learning for retraining. That is how Byrd earned her business certificate. At that time, Black people were not allowed in the front office, and she persisted in seeking secretarial work when raising her family required that she go back to work in the mills. In 1974, Byrd was finally hired at A.T. Cross, advancing from clerk to secretary for the Quality Control Manager, a role she held for 23 years.
In 2000, Byrd was hired by Family Resource Community Action as the secretary to Benedict Lessing, current President/CEO of what is now Community Care Alliance (CCA). “I found the job with a purpose for my life’s journey caring about and helping people in need,” Byrd said. In 2003, Byrd received the Paul Dempster Award for helping the homeless – the highest award offered by CCA; in 2023 she received the Appreciation Award for 20-plus years of service and commitment to advocating for the social and human needs of Woonsocket citizens. Byrd has received numerous other awards in the community for her social involvement, advocacy, and activism.
In the summer of 2023, CCA officially named their building at 245 Main Street the Josephine Byrd Community Services Building. During a dedication ceremony, she was honored for decades of civil rights activism and advocacy on behalf of disenfranchised individuals and families, and her ongoing public service in Woonsocket. “Those of you that know and love Josie know that she’s all about community,” said Lessing. “She was intimately involved in the civil rights movement and civil rights activities here in the city. She has always been trying to make this a better place for Black people, a better place for everyone that lives in this community. She and her family were instrumental in founding St. James Baptist Church. Faith has always been a big part of Josie’s life. She was my assistant, but I would like to say that she was more of my advisor.”
Speaking about her past advocacy, Josie was forthright. “Woonsocket has not always been friendly to Black people. We had to protest for fair housing. We had to fight for Black policemen on the force.” said Byrd. “I was on the committee pushing for the first Black policeman in the City of Woonsocket and that didn’t happen until the eighties. Martin Luther King’s birthday – I was at the Capitol building in Providence, making sure that it became a holiday in Rhode Island. So I’ve done some stuff.”
Josephine Byrd stands on the shoulders of her mother and other domestic workers who have cared for the needs of others. “We’re our sisters’ and brothers’ keepers,” says Byrd. She is one of 16 children, married for 50 years to the late Richard Byrd. She is the proud mother of three children and has five grandchildren.
