[2] The club was founded in 1906 by Celia Parker Woolley, a white Unitarian minister and novelist.
[3] The club met weekly, hosting speakers who discussed political events of the day, including votes for women.
Speakers included Elia W. Peattie, G. M. Faulkner of Liberia College, and Elmira Springer.
The club was only one aspect of the settlement house work focused on connecting middle-class black and white women.
[4] The influential black activist Fannie Barrier Williams supported the work of the center and the club, believing that interracial activism could both bring women's suffrage and improve the lives of black women and girls in Chicago.