brenda armstrong, black woman pioneer in medicine & activist
By Christine Kinyua
Dr. Brenda Armstrong was among the first African-Americans to attend Duke as an undergraduate student.[1] She later became the second black woman in the US to become a board-certified pediatric cardiologist.[2] Armstrong and her peers established the Afro-American Society (AAS) in the spring of 1967 and served as its president.[3] Armstrong helped organize protests of President Knight’s membership in the segregated Hope Valley Country Club and the subsequent study-in in Knight’s office in 1967.[4]
