1868, she was married to Rev. J. W. Early and removed to the State of Tennessee and was principal of one of the public schools of Memphis. She continued the work of teaching in Tennessee for eighteen years, having taught in all thirty-six years. During that time she instructed more than six thousand scholars, being principal of very large schools in four different cities. In the year 1886 she was elected superintendent of the temperance work among the colored people of the Southern States by the National Women's Christian Temperance Union. In the year 1890 she was appointed by the National Temperance Missionary Society to travel and lecture among the colored people of the Southern States in the capacity of superintendent and also of missionary. In four years she has traveled in seven States, accomplishing many thousand miles, and has lectured more than one thousand times to very large audiences; has visited and talked to more than five hundred schools and conferences of religious bodies; has visited two hundred prisons and talked to the inmates, besides doing an immense amount of writing and other work in which she is now actively engaged.
The facts of this life of usefulness are very strong evidence of the very remarkable ability of this noble woman. She was a woman in the field when it cost something to be a woman, and when only such brave and invincible characters as she could stay in the field. In the midst of threats and suspected bodily harm by night and by day, in those dark days of our history, Mrs. Early stood like a granite wall in the defense of right and truth.
