Located in Toledo's Pinewood district, where some two thirds of the city's African Americans lived by the end of the 1920s, the pharmacy became a popular neighborhood gathering place. The Stewarts, who owned the building and lived in the spacious eight rooms above the pharmacy, often hosted visitors from out of town, including luminaries such as Marian Anderson, Mary McLeod Bethune, and W. E. B. Du Bois. By the 1930s Stewart became a leading member of community groups in Toledo, including the Young Women's Christian Association (YWCA) and the Enterprise Charity Club, a social-service organization run by African-American women. From 1944 to 1948 she served as president of the Ohio Association of Colored Women; and from 1948 to 1952, as president of the National Association of Colored Women's Clubs (NACWC). As leader of the NACWC, Stewart spoke out against segregation, discrimination, and racist stereotypes. In 1961 she became an inaugural member of the Toledo Board of Community Relations, which worked to improve race relations in the city, and to ensure enforcement of civil-rights legislation. Stewart's civic activities eventually took on an international dimension: in 1952 she was appointed as an American delegate to the International Conference of Women of the World, held in Athens, Greece. She subsequently spent time during the 1950s touring as a goodwill ambassador for the United States; in 1954 one such U.S. State Department tour took her to several nations in Southeast Asia. In 1963 she was appointed to the United States commission of the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO). Stewart spent the rest of her life in Toledo, remaining active as a volunteer and philanthropist. Her husband William Stewart died in 1976 at the age of 83, and she moved into a retirement home a few years later, in 1980. She died in 1987, at the age of 94. Ella Nora Phillips Stewart is known not only for becoming one of the first African American female pharmacists but also for her struggles against discrimination and her impact in the community. Selected awards and honors