According to fellow activist, Bernice Johnson Reagon, many women within the Civil Rights Movement followed Baker’s example, adopting a practice of dissemblance about their private lives that allowed them to be accepted as individuals within the movement.
While traveling throughout the South on behalf of the NAACP, Baker met hundreds of black people, establishing lasting relationships with them.
This personalized approach to political work was one important aspect of Baker’s effective effort to recruit more members, both men and women, into the NAACP.
Baker formed a network of people in the South who would be important in the continued fight for civil rights.
Baker worked closely with southern civil rights activists in Georgia, Alabama, and Mississippi, and gained respect for her organizing abilities.