December 2024
Nikki Giovanni passed after a long illness with cancer in Blacksburg, Virginia. Condolences and tributes came from around the world.
September 2024
Wintergreen receives grant funding from the Mellon Foundation to launch The Women Gather: Building a Network to Embrace Black Women Writers. This implementation project builds on a previous Mellon-funded planning grant, and will strengthen Wintergreen’s operational capacity, deepen partnerships with mission-aligned organizations, advance archival work, support a graduate research fellow, and host a series of convenings to amplify the voices and creative lineages of Black women writers.
September 2024
Wintergreen Women participated in the fourth decade-defining conference: Celebrating the Worlds of Black Poetry. Among the presenters were DaMaris Hill, Sharan Strange, Latorial Faison, Leah Glenn, Hermine Pinson, Tyechia Thompson, Brenda Greene, Maryemma Graham, Meta DuEwa Jones, Liseli Fitzpatrick, Furious Flower Executive Director, Lauren K. Alleyne, and past director and founder Joanne Gabbin.
November 2022
Wintergreen Women Writers Collective received 501c3 status and became a nonprofit organization.
September 2019
Furious Flower celebrated its 25th Anniversary in Washington, DC at the Grand Hyatt and the National Museum of African American History and Culture. Nikki Giovanni and Sonia Sanchez were among our Honorary Hosts. In the 25th Anniversary Reading were the following Wintergreen Women: Toi Derricotte, Camille T. Dungy, Nikki Giovanni, Sonia Sanchez, Joanne Gabbin and Lauren K. Alleyne.
October 2012
Nikki Giovanni, Joanne Gabbin and Maya Angelou hosted “Sheer Good Fortune” celebrating Toni Morrison at Virginia Tech. Both Maya Angelou and Toni Morrison received Lifetime Achievement Awards from the Furious Flower Poetry Center. The Wintergreen Women who presented at this star-studded event were Toi Derricotte, Mari Evans, Virginia VC. Fowler, Joanne V. Gabbin, Nikki Giovanni, Carmen Gillespie, Maryemma Graham, Trudier Harris, Akasha Hull, Deborah McDowell, Opal Moore, Joyce Pettis, Sonia Sanchez, Ethel Morgan Smith, and Carla Du Pree.
August 2009
Publication of Shaping Memories: Reflections of African American Women Writers, edited by Joanne Gabbin. It was the first publication of the Collective and offered short essays on pivotal moments that strongly influenced their careers.
September 1999
Several Wintergreen Women were contributors in the book, The Furious Flowering of African American Poetry, which was published in 1999 by the University Press of Virginia; they were Joanne Gabbin (editor), Shelley Anne Williams, Eugenia Collier, and Deborah McDowell.
September 1987
First gathering at Wintergreen Resort (in attendance: Daryl Dance, Paule Marshall, Opal Moore, Sandra Govan, Joanne Gabbin, Carmen Gillespie, Trudier Harris, and Catherine Rogers; also visiting was a bear, (whose name we never found out).