Jessie Frisby, pioneering South Street entrepreneur, church leader, and celebrated community activist, has died at 85

Jessie Frisby, 85, formerly of Philadelphia, the first African American woman to open a business on the 1500 block of South Street, an energetic church leader, and award-winning community activist, died Wednesday, Aug. 3, of a heart condition at Christiana Hospital in Newark, Del.

Ms. Frisby opened Jessie’s Ladies Shoppe, later known as Jessie’s Ladies Boutique, at 1537 South St. in March 1969 with an $8,000 loan, word-of-mouth publicity from her pastors, and tireless contributions from her daughter, Nadine Collins, and others. She overcame racial prejudice, financial restrictions, supply-chain issues, and uneven support from the city to eventually offer women’s wear, accessories, jewelry, and herbal health products to her customers.

She later launched the Itsy Bitsy children’s clothing store on the same block, and in 2005 turned a former barbershop at 1525 South St. into Jessie’s Herbal Essence health-products store. “I have been blessed by God, and he has given me that stick-to-it-tiveness,” she told the Philadelphia Tribune in 1997. “I know many wonder how I did it.”

A tireless activist for nearby business associates and residents in her Southwest Center City neighborhood for nearly 60 years, Ms. Frisby purchased the building at 1537 in 1989 and retired in 2016 as the longest-established African American business owner on that block of South Street. Improving the lives of her customers and reinvigorating South Street west of Broad Street motivated her commercial and civic involvement, she had said.

Regarding her ownership of the Ladies Shoppe and children’s clothing store, she told the Tribune in 2007: “I’m a people person. I love to make people look good.” In 2009, regarding her herbal-products store, she told the Tribune: “This is a teaching as well as a healing ministry, and I love it. The main objective is to make people feel better.”

She was honored by City Council in 2012 for her decades of community involvement, and, to acknowledge her many contributions, her likeness was represented in a colorful mural that adorned the wall, now demolished, of the nearby historic Royal Theater. She also discussed health and wellness issues on local radio shows, and organized and participated in neighborhood fashion shows. A fashionista throughout her life, “she made a statement every time she entered a room,” her family said in a tribute.

“The many things that I learned from her will never be forgotten,” said Soyini Ayan, Ms. Frisby’s former business partner. Former colleague Raisa Jones said: “Because of her I will continue to stand out and speak up for what’s right.”

As president of the South Street West Business Association and a member of the Center City Residential Association and the South of South Street Neighborhood Association, Ms. Frisby supported structural improvements in the area and kept a close watch on the block’s gentrification boom. In 2011, she told the Daily News: ”People are coming in. They are building. They are making it difficult on the rest of us. Taxes are going up.”

She won the Madam CJ Walker award for “merits and achievements of local African American business women in the Delaware Valley area” from the Pennsylvania Chapter of the National Coalition of 100 Black Women, a 2003 Philadelphia Minority Enterprise Development award, and the Coretta Scott-King award for activism from the Ethnic & Multicultural Information Exchange Round Table of the American Library Association.

“You were the most beautiful, phenomenal mother that any daughter could ever have encountered in a lifetime on Earth,” her daughter said. “You truly earned my respect.”

Born Dec. 19, 1936, in Mount Olive, N.C., Jessie Louise McCoy moved to Philadelphia with her family when she was a child. She graduated from Bok Vocational High School and attended classes at Community College of Philadelphia and Temple University. She married Melvin Frisby and later Ronald Hyden, from both of whom she was divorced.

She was active with Leon Sullivan and the Zion Baptist Church for more than 50 years and a member of the Lott Carey Foreign Mission, and the Philadelphia chapter of the Women’s Aglow Fellowship, now Aglow International. She also worshiped at Mount Pleasant Baptist Church and counseled young women on daily telephone calls. “Spirituality was her fuel,” her family said.

She was a soprano and sang with several choirs, liked to cook, and lived in Mount Airy, Center City, and most recently Claymont, Del. Her goddaughter, Melissa Lowman, said, “She was my rock and a shoulder to lean on.”

In a tribute, grandchildren Larry, Danita, and Monica Sherrod said: “She taught us to be God-fearing, independent, strong, and have an entrepreneurial mindset. ... We will continue to live out her legacy.”

In addition to her daughter, grandchildren, former husband Melvin Frisby, and goddaughter, Ms. Frisby is survived by eight great-grandchildren, two brothers, a sister, and other relatives. Former husband Ronald Hyden, three sisters, and a brother died earlier.

Services were Saturday, Aug. 13.