I wanted to help. . . Marjorie Barringer says she chose to make a “significant” gift to LeMoyne-Owen College so that the HBCU can “continue on and help the children.” (Frederick Turner)

The eyes of Interim LeMoyne-Owen College President Johnnie Watson lit up when Marjorie Barringer – walking with a cane – gingerly made her way into his office.

Barringer was an expected guest. She was there to make a donation to the college, which historically has served Memphis’ African-American community.

The donation was ‘significant’ and LOC officials agreed with Barringer’s wish not to make the amount public. She handed the check to Watson, holding on to the envelope it came in so as to retain the multiple use forever stamp.

“This is a major contribution to the college,” said Watson. “Historically black colleges don’t get gifts like this everyday. We are appreciative, greatly.”

Barringer’s donation was an example of African-American philanthropy. And while discussions of philanthropy by African Americans pale in comparison to some other communities, African Americans have always given, albeit informally but generously to mutual aid societies, their churches and members of the community in need.

For Barringer, who was born in Memphis in 1917, the appropriateness of giving and helping is something she grew up with. African Americans, she said, “have always had a tough way to go.” And her mother was an example of how to respond to the needs of others.

Barringer said her mother often would take in children from families in need and “keep them until things got better” and that her father, who worked at a cotton compress, always supported the decision.

Last week’s gift was not the first Barringer has made to LeMoyne-Owen, noting an earlier donation when the school “got in a tight spot.” Her philanthropy also has been directed to Rust College, where she attended, and to The Piney Woods School in Mississippi.

Barringer said she once saw a television appeal for help to build Piney Woods. The appeal for everyone to give $1 struck her and stimulated her giving.

As for LeMoyne-Owen, Barringer said, “I would say it’s a good school. It’s very dutiful (in preparing students.)”

And, she said, LeMoyne-Owen is there for those who don’t have the money to send their children off to college.

Barringer lived in the Klondike community as a child and attended Booker T. Washington High School. She learned to sew, making all her dresses and eventually started sewing for the public.

Through the years she has had four husbands. Although she never had children, she has taken care of a number of them as if they were her own – just as her mother did.

While she has been to Jerusalem and made a point to see as much of the world as she could, Barringer said she would not live anywhere but Memphis, even though the city has it challenges.

Happiness, she said, is her ever-present state of mind.

“It’s nothing to do but be happy,” she said.

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