Jessie Abbott


Jessie Abbott was a member of the Tuskegee Institute community and was married to Cleveland Abbott. Together they worked to create one of the first organized women's college athletic programs at Tuskegee. They coached the first all-Black girls' track team to enter the Olympics. Jessie Abbott acted as the secretary for the wives of the presidents of Tuskegee as well as George Washington Carver.

Biography

She was born on 23 March 1897 and went to school in Des Moines, Iowa. She met her future husband, Cleveland Abbott, at the Drake Relays while he was a student at South Dakota State College. She died on 12 August 1982 in Tuskegee, Alabama.