In early May 1957, Sara Elizabeth Mooney, a 43-year-old American missionary and literary  specialist, arrived in Kenya. She was the granddaughter of Addison Clark, co-founder of Texas  Christian University in Fort Worth. She believed God had called her to teach adults to read and write to eliminate illiteracy in the world’s poorest corners. Her salary was $3,500 a year, which  is  approximately $43,453 today.

 She decided to help one of her assistants who had failed to complete high school get    admission  to a college in the States. She asked her brother, Mark Mooney, to send her books to  help him prepare for his college entrance exams. She then got him interested in a university  that would later admit him and acted as his referee in the application and as one of his initial   sponsors. He contacted her again during college for financial assistance, and she convinced a  charitable organisation to give him about $800 to support his studies. This was a considerable  amount at a time when tuition was only eighty-five dollars a semester, and summer school charged ten dollars per credit.

In July 1962, he visited her in her new home in Texas. In the visitors’ book, he wrote, “With the  love that never dies, I was received.” He also signed his name: Barack H. Obama. The full  import of her actions would become apparent when, 46 years later, his son would become the      44th president of the United States, four years after her death.

 Almost half a century later, in December 2000, an American billionaire visited South Africa and  pledged to build a state-of-the-art independent school. She vowed it would be the best high  school in the world, part of the ‘Ivy League’ in the South, for bright but poor and    disadvantaged   African girls. Some were orphans, many who lived on only a bowl of rice a day  and most who  had been affected by AIDS, rape, and disease. The school would eventually cost her more than  $140 million. She developed a 28-building campus on 52 acres of land. It featured 21 state-of-the-art  classrooms and six laboratories, including two for science and one for art, design,  technology and media. All were equipped with the latest technology. To top it all off, there was  a library with 10,000 volumes and a 600-seat amphitheatre. For recreation, she included a   gymnasium, tennis courts, a beauty salon, a yoga studio, and a wellness centre.

 She also determined that they would eat and reside in a manner befitting the children of a  billionaire. She had a dining room constructed featuring marble-topped tables, complete  with  cloth napkins, china, silverware, and crystal, all of which she personally selected.   Furthermore, she ensured that each dormitory was equipped with its own kitchen, and every room included a balcony and a spacious closet. She personally chose every tile, light fixture,  door handle, and the two-hundred-thread-count sheets for the girls.

To ensure the highest academic standards for her school, she hired Katherine G. Windsor,  PhD, the Head of Miss Porter’s School, to chair its board. Miss Porter’s is one of the most  prestigious and accomplished schools in the USA and the world, and the alma mater of two US first ladies, Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis and Barbara Bush. Windsor also serves on the      New England Association of Schools and Colleges board and the Commission on  Independent   Schools.

The South African government was astounded, if not appalled, by her extreme generosity. It told her that ‘African children sleep on dirt floors in huts with no water or electricity or share mattresses with relatives, so even the simplest environment would be a luxury for them.’ She       countered by saying, “I am creating everything in this school that I would have wanted for myself, so the girls will have the absolute best that my imagination can offer…. This school  will be a reflection of me.”

The school’s academic success is a testament to its quality. In a country where only 20% of students attend university, 90% of its students have progressed to higher education, with some  attending some of the world’s top universities, including Spelman, Brown, Wellesley, Oxford, and Stanford Medical School. The opening of the school in 2007 became one of the most covered events in the world,  ‘beating  a moon launch and even the burial of Gerald Ford, a former US president.’ It appeared  on the front pages of newspapers across the globe, in Time, Newsweek, and People, along with special reports on all network newscasts.

 In 2010, she would close the circle begun by Sara Elizabeth Mooney in early May 1957 by taking  her girls to visit the son of the high school dropout whose path to the United States Mooney had paved: President Barack Obama. 

As you may have guessed by now, the billionaire is Oprah Winfrey, best known for creating The Oprah Winfrey Show. The show became the highest-rated talk show in America for 25 years, reaching over 40 million viewers each week in the United States and being licensed in 150 countries worldwide by the time it concluded.

Time Magazine frequently cited her as one of the 100 most influential people of the 20th Century; Forbes named her the world’s most powerful celebrity in 2005, 2007, 2008, 2010, and 2013, and Life magazine named her as one of the 100 people who changed the world, alongside Jesus Christ, Elvis Presley, and Lady Mary Wortley Montagu. She was the only living woman to make the list.

In 2005, she was named in a public poll as the most incredible woman in American history and 9th overall on the list of greatest Americans. No one, however, has done more to promote dignity, develop potential, and celebrate the success of the African girl than Oprah. This makes her, without equivocation, the greatest woman of African descent in African history.