May 6, 2024 5 min read

Karen Mansfield/Observer-Reporter

Phyllis Waller, left, received the Washington NAACP Human Rights Award at the 64th annual NAACP Human Rights Award Banquet on Friday in Meadow Lands. Right is A. Michael Pratt, an attorney and Chair of the Philadelphia Litigation Practice, who delivered the keynote address.

Courtesy of Phyllis Waller

Washington NAACP Human Rights Award recipient Phyllis Waller.

More than six decades after her father, Louis E. Waller – a giant in the fight for civil rights in Washington County – re-launched the Washington NAACP branch, Phyllis Waller received the branch’s Human Rights Award at its 64th annual banquet at the DoubleTree by Hilton Inn.

Waller has followed in her father’s footsteps (he resurrected the branch in 1958 after it had disbanded, and won the Human Rights Award in 1965) and has become a force in her own right, dedicating her life to promoting human rights and social justice in the areas of voting rights for minorities and underserved groups, education, health, and employment.

“I grew up in the home of a civil rights family. My father got me involved. He fought for things like getting Washington Park pool integrated, he fought segregation in the Washington School District. I think about what he did, and how he got people to follow him. He was so good at being able to communicate what was going on,” said Waller, who also recalls her father’s 1964 “March to the Post Office” to urge passage of Civil Rights legislation. “I can’t talk like my dad or be exactly like him, but I try to do my best and be involved like he was.”

That, she has.

Like her father, Waller has served as president of the Washington NAACP, filling the post from 2015 to 2018, and has played a significant role in the branch for 35 years. She has served as third vice president of the Pennsylvania State Conference of the NAACP Branches and NAACP Freedom Fund chairman.

In addition to her work with the NAACP, Waller has been active in civil affairs and engagement for decades and has served in several community leadership roles, including a member of the Washington School District Board of Directors, president of the League of Women Voters, chairman of Abernathy Black Community Development Corporation Board of Directors, and a member of the Center for Coalfield Justice.

“She has toiled for many years, just like her mother and father, for the NAACP and for this community, and I know she will continue to do so for a long time,” said A. Michael Pratt, an attorney and Chair of the Philadelphia Litigation Practice, who delivered the keynote address. Pratt has known Waller since his days as a student at Washington & Jefferson College, and said the Washington NAACP propelled his involvement in the organization.

Waller said her involvement with the NAACP accelerated in the early 1990s when she served on the executive committee under former president John T. Asbury.

“Back then, there was no saying no. When you were asked to do something, you did it,” said Waller, 67. “When I started on the executive committee, my father said don’t be there asking 50 million questions, you’re there to listen and to learn. And that’s exactly what I did. And it worked. All these years, the branch has been successful.”

Waller said that after her father passed away in 2009, James “Cookie” McDonald, who tirelessly worked for nonviolent solutions to social justice reforms, became her mentor. She recalled how McDonald and her father had met civil rights leader Medgar Evers before he was killed at his home by a Ku Klux Klan member in 1963 while working to end Jim Crow laws in Mississippi, and after Evers’s death, McDonald traveled there to meet with his widow.

“After my dad passed away, I called Mr. McDonald and said, ‘I can’t get any more information from my father, so I’m going to call on you. And he’s been there for me since then,” she said, noting she learned from their tenacity and fearlessness.

Waller earned a bachelor’s degree in business administration from Robert Morris University and worked for the Waller Corporation, a business her father started, until her retirement in 2008.

Waller has received the One Kid At A Time Fellowship Award from the Academy of Adolescent Health, Talk Minority Action Group Black History Maker Award, and was a Zonta Club Rose Day Honoree in 2022.

She acknowledges the progress made in the ongoing struggle for human rights, but said there is still a long way to go.

“We’ve achieved many accomplishments over the years, but for me, I feel that we’re going backwards with how some people are attacking rights, like voting,” said Waller. “My mother and father instilled fighting for equality in us, all of us. My dad kept going as long as he could, he was a part of (the NAACP) until he couldn’t walk into that building anymore, and my mother stayed active until she couldn’t anymore either. I’m just going to continue to be fearless. I’ll keep on going.”