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Retired milliner, 97, honored by Smithsonian; credits God for success
By Elizabeth Fisher, Catholic News Service
DARBY, Pa. (CNS)—Mae Reeves makes a wonderful first impression.
Her smile draws attention to an attractive face that’s adorned with the slightest hint of blush. Her easy laughter seems to come from deep within a joyful soul. She’s stylish and charming, and, although her demeanor doesn’t reflect it, she is, at the age of 97, a celebrity.
Reeves, a Catholic, was the first black woman to start a business in Philadelphia. Trained as a hat-maker at the Chicago School of Millinery in the 1930s, she opened a shop on South Street in Philadelphia in 1940. Later, she took her business to West Philadelphia, where she made and sold her creations until her retirement in the 1980s, said her daughter, Donna Limerick.
Thirty of her creations will be part of a permanent collection at the Smithsonian’s new National Museum of African American History and Culture in Washington when it is completed in 2015.
Reeves described her work as “making a living.” Her recollections are of customers coming in “from all over” to buy hats of every style and shape, from small black hats with delicate veils to more dramatic confections in a variety of colors, festooned with ribbons and flowers.
Customers included such luminaries as Lena Horne, Ella Fitzgerald, Marion Anderson and Mrs. Walter Annenberg.
“I designed my own hats, and I had to go to New York to buy the materials I needed. It took a lot of time to shape those designs and to size the hats,” recalled Reeves, a resident of St. Francis Country Home in Darby.
On a recent afternoon during an interview with The Catholic Standard & Times, newspaper of the Philadelphia Archdiocese, she appeared pleasantly surprised when reminded her work has been chosen by the Smithsonian.
“Well, God bless them,” was her response.
If Reeve’s life story were a book, it would be a page-turner filled with tragedy, endurance, deep faith and a motivation to succeed. From the beginning, she set her goals and pursued them with enthusiasm.
Born in Vidalia, Ga., and orphaned at age 14, she and her five siblings were raised by her grandmother. The second oldest, she had to help take care of her younger brothers and sisters.
Her grandmother set the stage for Reeves’ interest in fashion by dressing her every day in lace dresses and adorning her hair with ribbons as a child.
Reeves graduated from the Dickerson Training School in Vidalia in 1928, then went to Georgia State Teachers College. Following graduation, she taught for a while in Tombs County, Ga., and worked for the local newspaper.
At age 19, she married William Buddy Mincey, who owned a tailor shop in Lyon, Ga. The couple had a son. A few years later, her husband was killed in a car accident.
Reeves continued teaching, but from 1931 to 1934, she spent summers at the Chicago School of Millinery. She learned to make and shape hats, but she also decorated them with the flowers and ribbons for which she later became famous.
In 1934, after visiting a brother in Philadelphia, she moved to the city. She sold cosmetics part-time, then worked at a ladies apparel shop. In 1940, at age 28, she opened her own shop with a $500 bank loan.
In 1944, she opened a new shop and met Joel Edward Reeves. The couple married three years later and had two children. Joel died in 1982.
Reeves also worked tirelessly to raise funds for Our Lady of the Rosary Parish in West Philadelphia, where she was a parishioner for 56 years.
She developed friendships among the Sisters of St. Joseph, who taught at the school. Reeves said she gladly drove them on various errands, and they came to rely on her for transportation. She often invited them to her family’s country house for picnics “and to just relax.”
May retired in 1997 at the age of 85. She continued to take hat orders from her special clients while still living on the second floor of her shop.
By 2003, her severe arthritis left her unable to traverse the steps. She moved into St. Francis where “they take such good care of me,” she said, and where she has the opportunity to attend daily Mass.
Her frailty seems no match for her ebullient spirits.
“I’m very happy because I believe doing good things in life makes you happy. I can say that I’ve worked hard to make others happy, too,” she said.
In 2009, the National Museum of African American History and Culture was in search of stories that depicted the lives of black families in America. Limerick, then a producer for National Public Radio, nominated her mother, and museum representatives were soon at her door, Limerick said.
At a July ceremony at the African American Museum in Philadelphia, Reeves was presented with the key to the city of Philadelphia. Limerick and several other women modeled the hats chosen by the museum.
On Oct. 29—Reeves’ 98th birthday—she was to receive the Pioneer Award from the Philadelphia Multicultural Affairs Congress.
Reeves takes little credit for the honors bestowed on her. She thanks God for everything.
“I always relied on him. Nobody else could have helped me as he did, giving me that kind of mind. I praise him always for what he did for me,” she said.
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