Location: 3rd row of pillars north of Belden, on the sidewalk.
Installed: Aug. 2017
DePaul University, from its very start, always claimed diversity among its students as an asset. The mix of students at DePaul changed over time, but that mix always met the needs of marginalized groups looking to access higher education. At the end of the 1943-44 academic year, DePaul saw its first two African American graduates, both with Bachelor of Science degrees in education: Marion Amoureaux and Rose Vaughan.
In the composition, Rose Vaughan, who went on to become a teacher in the Chicago Public Schools, is standing and Marion Amoureux, who spent a good deal of her career at ‘The Chicago Defender’ is seated. The Chicago Defender was a leading African American publication, considered the “most important” newspaper of its kind.
This composition, like the McCabe pillar and the D-men pillar, features the use of crimson curtains. These curtains are a visual device that ‘reveal’ what is really important in a formal sense. In this case the curtains allow the viewer to see the figures on a stage, as if they were part of a commencement ceremony. On the reverse side of this pillar, Rachel Eubanks designed a medallion that commemorates the first two African Americans to graduate from DePaul.
