Identity area
Type of entity
Person
Authorized form of name
Moore, E. Andrea
Parallel form(s) of name
- Moore, Ethel Andrea
Standardized form(s) of name according to other rules
Other form(s) of name
Identifiers for corporate bodies
Description area
Dates of existence
1946-2005
History
E. Andrea Moore (1946-2005) was an advocate, community builder, and memory-keeper for the Black community of Windsor, Ontario, and a proud fifth-generation descendant of enslaved African-Americans who freed themselves by escaping to Canada via the Underground Railroad. She was born Ethel Andrea Shreve, daughter of Abraham and Ethel Winifred (née Christian) Shreve, and grew up with siblings Catherine Lucille (Shreve) Adu-Peasah, Claudia Maria Shreve, James Eric Shreve, and Muriel Joanne Shreve. With husband Fitz Moore (a Caribbean-Canadian from Trinidad and Tobago via England) she raised daughter Irene, often discussing their family history around the kitchen table.
Andrea Moore worked for the Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce (CIBC) for over twenty years, while also giving extensive time and energy to her community and its history. She served as president of the Windsor and District Black Coalition, was an advisor to the Sankofa News, and spent 16 years as a member of the Hour-a-Day Study Club. She also took an active role in church life, including time spent as a Sunday School teacher, as a connectional trustee and conference treasurer of the British Methodist Episcopal (BME) Church, and as a member of All Saints’ Anglican Church. Andrea Moore enjoyed historical research projects, collected and preserved a wide array of documents and photos relating to Black history in the Windsor area, and was a frequent public speaker on Black history topics. She founded and served as president of the Essex County Black Historical Research Society, and chaired the Underground Railroad Monument Committee of Windsor (whose efforts resulted in the 2001 unveiling of a monument in downtown Windsor, with a counterpart in Detroit). She was a founding board member for the North American Black Historical Museum (now the Amherstburg Freedom Museum) where she established volunteer tour guide training and often led tours herself. Her many years as a community builder were honoured with a Queen Elizabeth II Golden Jubilee Medal in 2002.
Sources: Obituary for Ethel Andrea Moore, Families First Funeral Home, https://www.familiesfirst.ca/memorials/ethel-andrea-moore/3479206/service-details.php; “Christian Family History – Part 5,” Amherstburg Freedom Museum, https://amherstburgfreedom.org/christian-family/; Simone J. Smith, “The Power of Ancestral Knowledge: Author and Historian Irene Moore Davis,” Toronto Caribbean (3 April 2019), https://torontocaribbean.com/the-power-of-ancestral-knowledge-author-and-historian-irene-moore-davis/ (all accessed 27 September 2021).