Maggie L. Walker

Maggie Lena Walker was born in Richmond, Virginia, shortly after the Civil War, to a formerly enslaved mother, and became active as a teenager in the Independent Order of St. Luke, a fraternal and mutual aid society serving Richmond's Black community. She rose through the organisation's leadership, and in 1899 became its Right Worthy Grand Secretary, a position she used to dramatically expand the order's reach, membership, and financial resources over the following decades.

In 1903, Walker founded the St. Luke Penny Savings Bank in Richmond, becoming the first woman of any race in the United States to charter a bank and serve as its president. The bank provided crucial access to loans and financial services for Richmond's Black community at a time when mainstream banks routinely refused to serve Black customers, and it survived the Great Depression through a series of mergers, continuing to operate under successor institutions for decades.

Beyond banking, Walker founded a newspaper, the St. Luke Herald, and a department store employing Black women, and remained deeply involved in civic life, including the NAACP and women's suffrage movements, despite becoming wheelchair-bound later in life due to diabetes complications. She continued leading her business enterprises from her wheelchair until her death in 1934.