This Black History Month, we honor Dr. Flemmie P. Kittrell, the first African American woman to earn a Ph.D. in Nutrition, whose work revolutionized child development and the U.S. Head Start program.
Born in 1904 in North Carolina to sharecropping parents, Flemmie Pansy Kittrell was the eighth of nine children. From the age of 11, she worked as a cook and maid to help fund her education. Her perseverance paid off when she earned her Ph.D. in Nutrition from Cornell University in 1936, becoming the first Black woman in the United States to do so.
Kittrell returned to her undergraduate alma mater, Hampton University, to teach and eventually led the Department of Home Economics. She became dean of women and the first Black female trustee at the university. Later, she chaired the Home Economics program at Howard University and directed the nation’s first full-scale nutritional survey abroad.
Her research went beyond food. Kittrell was deeply interested in holistic child development, studying how the environment, nutrition, and health intersect to shape early learning. In the 1960s, she directed an experimental nursery at Howard University, a model that laid the groundwork for the federal Head Start program.
Through her advocacy, Kittrell coined the term “hidden hunger”, highlighting people who had enough food but insufficient nutrition. She trained thousands of professionals for the Head Start initiative and consulted internationally on children’s health and nutrition.
A D.C. resident, Kittrell was often at the White House with First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt championing global hunger issues and women’s rights. Her work continues to impact millions of children in low-income households across the United States.
Kittrell transformed the lives of children and families through nutrition, early education, and empowerment, showing how one person’s vision can change a nation.
