Women power did not just begin. Unnoticeably it’s been
around for centuries. It isn’t about celebrity or popularity; it’s about
influence. My late Mom, Esther Wah-Wede Bedell, affectionately known as “Ma
Wede” and “O Lord,” is perhaps the most listened-to woman in Harper City during
her lifetime. She reared good number of kids who have become respected
individuals in Liberia and the world. Many are successful in their own rights.
In some cases to figure out a woman’s contribution, analysis
looked for those who run countries, big companies or influential nonprofits.
Their rankings are a combination of two scores: visibility and the size of the
organization or country they lead. My late Mom, Ma Wede, did not lead a country.
But she groomed young men and women who have joined leadership in very
important parts of the world including Liberia.
Ma Wede was born December 20, 1929 to Episcopalian parents.
At age 20 she experienced a serious biological problem that affected her womanhood.
Consequently, she could no longer bear kids. Intrigued by her surrounding
evidential circumstances to her life and Church, she gave her life and heart to
Jesus Christ and accepted her condition. In early youth she exhibited traces of
exquisite sensibility, soundness of understanding, and decision of character.
She received no literary instructions.
Before her nineteenth year she became acquainted with Mr.
Ngee (my spelling) Wilson, a mechanical engineer, who would be her husband in
later years. Mr. Wilson possessed good taste and good engineering knowledge. He
seemed to have given her the first impulse to the formation of her haracter. At
nineteenth, she left her parents and resided with her brother J. Wah-Doe Bedell
who had just entered Cape Palmas High School in Harper City. She was there to
help her brother with his domestic chores. At graduation, her brother moved to
Monrovia to pursue further studies. She took on her own roof and gave attention
to her mother who was growing older. Her mother’s health made her presence
necessary in her home. On the death of her mother, Ma Wede took on more
responsibilities for her young sibling (Julia Wah-Kuno Bedell) and sometimes
the older ones.
Ma Wede became a teacher from motives of benevolence, or
rather philanthropy, and during the time she continued, she gave proof of
superior qualification for the performance of its arduous and important duties.
The pecuniary concerns of her father early death made her practiced rigid
economy in her expenditures, and with her savings was enabled to procure her
sisters and brothers situations, to which without aid, they could not have had
access; her mother was sustained at length from her fund. She even found means
to take under her protection other people’s children in dire need of academic
education and social skills to maximize their full human potential through
training and guidance.
Ma Wede was a true philanthropist and humanist.
She invested her time and resources in grooming kids of
other parents. Besides those we may not remember, she reared Mrs. Elizabeth
Bedell Woart, Messrs. Toh-Himmie (brother of Liberia’s football legend,
WanniboToe – the wizard dribbler of the national Lone Star of Liberia), Henry
Wah-Toe Bedell (her eldest brother’s son named in the stead of one of her
brothers), S. K. Bedell, II (named instead of her eldest brother Gen. S. K.
Bedell), Sarah Wilson, Mary Dwedeh Bedell, Gbuo, Boryornor and little Kidau who
is the youngest of them all. Among all of those she reared, Mr. Thomas G.
Bedell is her only adopted son. At age 5, she adopted him from her late brother
Gen. S. K. Bedell, Snr.
Ma Wede had not wanted confidence in her own powers of
persuasion before. But the reception this work met from the public, gave her an
opportunity of judging what those powers were, in the estimation of others. It
was shortly after this, that she commenced the work to which these remarks are
prefixed. What are its merits will be decided in the judgment of each person
and/or reader of this document. Suffice it to say, she appeared to have stepped
forth boldly, and singly, in defense of humanity, which by usages of all
society, whether savage or civilized, have been kept from attaining their
dignity.
She was blessed with six siblings. Besides J. Wah-Doe
Bedell, all other siblings predeceased her including, Gen. S. Wah-Kwee Bedell,
Snr., H. Wah-Toe Bedell, Snr., Helena Wahde Bedell Neufville, H. Wah-Gleh
Bedell, and Julia Wah-Kuno Bedell.
1958 she was founder of the Harper Women Recreation
Organization. She almost became involved directly into politics as she was
being encouraged by her colleagues to seek political office. 1960 Cofounder,
Kudemoweh Women Association in Harper. She chaired it up to 1963.
Honors: she was honored by the late Superintendent of
Maryland County, Hon. James Daniel Anderson as the Most Outstanding woman of
the Year.
Ma Wede departed this world on November 1, 2009. She was
born on December 20, 1928 in Harper, Maryland County, Republic of Liberi.
I am T. Gbuo-Mle Bedell; volunteer worker, social justice
advocate, speaking and working on the ground in Liberia and a victim of police
brutality.
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