1864-1935
Emma Coleman ran and served as President of Coleman National Business College, at Academy and Halsey, in Newark after the death of her husband in 1903. She worked to adapt the school to the 20th century including expanding shorthand and practical offerings.
Born in Poughkeepsie, as Emma Holman, Emma was the second wife of Henry Coleman. Emma started working as a servant in his household by age 15 (1880 census). She moved with the family to Newark in 1880. Henry’s first wife died in 1889 and Emma and Henry married in 1892; she was 26 years his junior. The couple had three daughters, all under 10 upon Henry’s 1903 death.
In Newark, the family lived at 25 Homestead Park and Emma continued to live there raising her daughters, until moving to Maplewood a few years prior to her death.
Bibliography
NJ Women’s Project, “Past and Promise: The Lives of NJ Women” (extensive)
Kukla, Barbara J., “Newark Women: From Suffragettes to the State House”
C-25 Coleman Business College, Newark News Morgue, Newark Public Library
Coleman Business School material. New Jersey Historical Society
“Mrs. Henry Coleman” New York Times July 23, 1935
Ad, Newark Star, Aug 26, 1909
“Business College President Dies” Newark News July 22, 1935
Ancestry.com photo
“Head of local College Dead” Newark News Dec 7, 1903
Census records