Her mother Vashti Turley Murphy was a co-founder of Delta Sigma Theta sorority.
[2] The eldest of five daughters, Elizabeth studied at Frederick Douglass High School and the University of Minnesota, where she gained a bachelor's degree in journalism.
She published a book titled Be Strong: The Life of Vashti Turley Murphy in 1980.
She mentored many Afro American journalists who went on to work with The Sun, The Washington Post and The New York Times.
[4] She was awarded honorary doctorate of humane letters by Morgan State University in 1976[5] She married her first husband Frank W. Phillips Jr who died in 1962.