Founding Board Member and Dear Friend of The Ernest A. Finney, Jr. Cultural Arts Center, Marjorie Hammock was born in Atlanta, Georgia on January 24, 1936 and grew up in Connecticut. Her parents moved to the North as part of the Great Migration. In 1962, Hammock moved to New York and joined the Congress of Racial Equality (CORE) and became more involved in civil rights organizing. Hammock worked for Rep. Shirley Chisholm (the first black woman elected to the United States Congress) during her campagin for the U.S. House of Representatives in 1968.

In the 1970s, Hammock moved to South Carolina and served as the Executive Director of the South Carolina chapter of the National Association of Social Workers. A practicing social worker for 50 years, Hammock served as the Chief of Social Work Service for the Department of Corrections and Field Coordinator in the Department of Social Work at Benedict College. She received her BA from Spelman College and her MSW degree from Howard University. She was a passionate supporter and defender of the arts and remained active in civil rights and politics throughout her life in Columbia, SC.

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USC DEPARTMENT OF ORAL HISTORY: Marjorie Brittain Hammock oral history interview

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Written Transcript