1860 – 1941
Louise M. Troy was born in 1860 in Xenia, the daughter of a Civil War veteran. She began teaching in the Dayton school system in 1878, at schools on Ziegler Street and on Fifth Street at Baxter Street. In 1887, Dayton schools were integrated and Louise was the only Black American teacher who was retained. She provided teacher training to young black women in the early 1900s. Much of her teaching career was spent at Garfield School, where she taught until her retirement
in 1920. Her pupils included Paul Laurence Dunbar, James Parsons, and William O. Stokes as well as many future educators. Her civic involvement included founding the Women’s Christian Association, which later became the YWCA. In 1909, she bought the house at Fifth and Horace streets that was used for west-side YWCA
activities. Louise Troy served as the first treasurer and a founding member of the Dayton branch of the NAACP.