Carrie Dixon, of the Village of De Luna, does whatever she can to ensure women in her circle know about the sacrifices other African American women made to create history. She believes that is how lessons of survival will be shared with younger generations.
As the lead event planner for the Women’s History Month program hosted
March 26 by The African American Club of The Villages, Dixon, the incoming club president, said the program’s theme “Moving Forward Together” captures the goal of all sisterhood organizations.
The theme echoes the 2025 International Women’s History Month theme, “Moving Forward Together! Women Educating and Inspiring Generations.”
“Educating and inspiring generations, that’s what sister groups are all about,” Dixon said. “History that we’ve been taught doesn’t tell us in meaningful detail about our African American sheros — women whose shoulders we are standing on after they made a sacrifice to make history. That’s why we are highlighting it during the women’s history program. It’s important to know true history, the real history.”
Dixon said it’s important to celebrate and educate about women who have served in the military or who have dedicated their time to educating, mentoring and leading others.
U.S. Army Capt. Shanda Taylor-Boyd, a spokesperson for disabled veterans groups including Disabled American Veterans, Camp4Heroes, and Villagers for Veterans, used singing, storytelling and moments from her own life to explain how sheros are formed.
She spoke on the importance of laying a foundation for the next generation by sharing stories of her mother and grandmother as if she were speaking to her own granddaughter.
“She is not even 2 yet, but maybe one day I will talk to her about this,” Taylor-Boyd said. “I saw my grandmother read her Bible every night, and my mother could make something out of nothing. They did the important work of laying a foundation of lifelong principles and pillars. I learned how to relate to and respect people and their property by watching these women.”
Taylor-Boyd faced many obstacles in her life, but managed to turn each into an opportunity.
Her first opportunity came while attending Army ROTC as one of the first women to attend Valley Forge Military Academy and College in the 1980s. She received a full scholarship, which helped her go on to have a 23-year military career.
While working as a psychiatric nurse at Joint Base Lewis-McChord Madigan Army Medical Center and homeschooling her daughters, Taylor-Boyd was involved in an automobile accident that left her having headaches and seizures. It was four years until she was fully diagnosed with a traumatic brain injury. Taylor-Boyd said it was the sheros in her life that kept her motivated.
“Resilience. That’s really the definition of a shero,” she said. “It’s like the saying, ‘If you don’t stand for something, you’ll fall for anything.’ You have to have confidence that someone somewhere believes in you.”
Dixon, a veteran who served for two years, said she didn’t learn about the 6888th Central Postal Directory Battalion until nearly two years ago reading about it The Smithsonian Magazine. She became motivated to share information about the unit’s history.
Part of the Women’s Army Corps, the 6888th unit, with 855 members, was the first and only unit composed of mostly Black women that was deployed to England during WWII to sort a large backlog of mail.
Ingrid Burton Nathan, a Central Florida resident, also hadn’t heard of the group until recently. In December 2024, while watching the Tyler Perry movie “The Six Triple Eight” highlighting the soldiers in the 6888th, she learned her adoptive mother served in the unit.
“If I had never watched that movie, I would have never known about my mom being a member of the 6888th,” Nathan said. “We have a picture of her in her military outfit. I knew that she served in WWII, but that’s it. She died when I was 5, so we never had the chance to have conversations and no one else said anything.
“When I instantly saw the women dressed like my mom was in the picture we had, I said ‘mom dressed like that,’” she said. “I would have missed it if I didn’t rewind. After all the credits rolled, I was just still sitting there looking at the TV. I got this feeling and said, ‘This is a long shot, but I wonder.’ It was God telling me to look again. I went back and watched it again as I got to the ‘E,’ I saw my mom’s full name — Edna Cross Burton.”
Nathan said she knew that after her time in the military, her mother taught classes to help veterans get their GEDs. She said her mother’s boldness and passion for education are part of what encouraged her to be the first Black student to attend an all-white school while enrolled in the Seminole County Public School system in 1964.
“She was bold enough to go into WWII. She had the resolve to go help her county,” Nathan said. “I didn’t hesitate when my father asked me if I wanted to go the white school. I wanted to know why we were thought to be less than. I was competitive in school. I didn’t know how to stop and quit. I was motivated to succeed by everyone who loved me. My mother, before she passed, told me I was smart. I believed her.”
Though she didn’t have the opportunity to learn the full scope her mother’s legacy and impact on American history, Nathan was able to learn lessons of survival from her mom. She said survival is an important lesson younger generations need to learn.
“We want them to know how we survived,” Nathan said. “We have to know when to fight back against injustice and use rational, cunning thinking to survive.”
As a mother and frequent mentor to the youth, Dixon agrees knowing how to survive and not make excuses is key.
“I often say to my own children, ‘Don’t tell me why something didn’t happen,’” Dixon said. “I want you to tell me how you will make it happen. (Our ancestors) endured trauma and discrimination and still succeeded. Don’t tell me you can’t be successful. It’s in your DNA. Believing in the future is important for the sustainability of anything.”
To support future generations, TAAC and the Sophisticated Gents have worked together to give 280 scholarships totaling $433,000 to local students.
The clubs hold the joint annual Friendship Golf Tournament Scholarship Fundraiser for graduating high school students in Lake, Marion and Sumter counties going to college. This year’s tournament is scheduled for Oct. 25 at Harbor Hills Country Club in Lady Lake.
Former club president Debra Stevenson, who served from 2022 to 2024, said it’s important to educate and inspire young people to empower them to protect the rights of historically marginalized groups during a time when those rights are being jeopardized.
“I’m passionate about this,” she said. “I think next is that we have to encourage striving for higher and higher. You should always continue to advance yourself and educate yourself. We, as women and minorities, have to be prepared to be at the table to make some of these changes.”
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Popularized during the Women’s Movement of the 1960s, the word “shero” actually goes back to the 19th century. In her speech at The African American Club of The Villages’ Women’s History Month program, U.S. Army Capt. Shanda Taylor-Boyd turned the word into an acronym to explain the qualities and characteristics that define a shero:
Service or civic duty actions.
Helping others in humble ways.
Educating those around them.
Relationships that are solid and filled with support.
Optimizing obstacles into opportunities.
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