Learn more about Mary McLeod Bethune's life and work including her founding and leading the National Council of Negro Women, Inc. and their purchase of the Council House. Bethune used the power of education, political activism, and civil service to advance racial and gender equality throughout the United States and the world. The first person in her family born free and the first person in her family afforded a formal education, Bethune emerged from abject poverty and oppression to achieve greatness as an advisor to four United States presidents and an internationally recognized leader in the struggle for civil, women's, and human rights.