Found 204 collections related to Authors, Black

The National Research Council Committee on the Status of Black Americans working papers consist of thirty-three essays prepared by prominent scholars in several fields as background for the publication, A Common Destiny: Blacks and American Society (National Academy Press, 1989). less

The collection contains materials used to create the Mary Lou Williams documentary, Music on My Mind, directed by Joanne Burke. Music on My Mind focuses on Williams's enduring contribution to American culture as a jazz pianist, composer, and vocalist. This collection includes a short autobiography (incomplete), transcripts of interviews, information on the financial support of the documentary, film technical edits, reel catalog, and an information kit about the documentary. less

This collection consists of personal and professional papers of Jessica B. Davis; the majority of the collection contains materials related to Davis's role as president of the Westchester Branch of Key Women of America. Most of this material is comprised of correspondence, reports, event programs, brochures, speeches written by Davis, and clippings on the branch and its members. Additionally, there is some material pertaining to Davis's other affiliations, mostly involving her work with A. Philip Randolph. There is a limited amount of personal material, which includes resumes, some correspondence, and papers on her brother and daughter. less

This collection consists of biographical material, programs, catalogs, printed material about Carver, plant specimens, and correspondence. Most of the correspondence is between Carver and Ford Davis, a white scientist employed at the Tom Houston Peanut Company in Georgia. In their letters, they discuss Carver's health problems, aspirations, and plans, and lament the fact that Carver's being Black prevents him and Davis from working together as fellow scientists. less

Amiri Baraka's collection of unpublished poetry consists of over two hundred poems, which, according to Baraka, were written between 1959 and 1965. With the exception of three poems, all are unpublished. Most items bear holograph corrections, changes, and deletions, and most are short poems of one page in length. Included in the collection is a four-page bibliography compiled by the author containing entries not noted in other publications. Additionally, there is a six-page manuscript entitled "Uncle Tom's Cabin: An Alternate Ending". less

Eva Jessye, African American choral director, composer, arranger, and music historian was born in Coffeyville, Kansas, in 1895. In 1914, she graduated from Western University of Kansas City with a degree in music and then went on to Langston University in Oklahoma. She moved to New York in 1926 and by 1930, Jessye had formed and directed a professional choir. She was the first musical director for the original production of George Gershwin's Porgy and Bess. Acknowledged as the first African American woman to win international distinction as a director of a professional choir, Jessye was the recipient of numerous awards and honorary doctoral degrees throughout her life. She died at 97 in Ann Arbor, Michigan. The Eva Jessye collection contains clippings, correspondence, writing, and programs that document Jessye's professional career and recognition in her field. less

Robert E. Penn, Jr. (1948- ) is an African-American LGBT activist, a writer, and a producer. The Robert E. Penn papers, dating from 1971 to 2003, reflect Penn's work as an activist; his work as Assistant Director of Education, HIV Prevention for the Gay Men's Health Crisis (GMHC); his work as the author of the The Gay Men's Wellness Guide for the National Lesbian and Gay Health Association (NLGHA); his family and personal life; and writings. The collection holds clippings, correspondence, manuscript drafts, notes, posters, printed matter, and audio and visual materials. less

Charles Anthony Frye (1946-1994) was an early proponent of Black studies and taught philosophy, religion, and literature, and he was a published novelist and poet. The Charles A. Frye papers, 1964-1995, reflect the teaching and writer career of this professor of African and African American philosophy, religion, and literature. less

The Rosa Guy papers contain material related to her personal life, her writing, and her professional career. The personal matter includes correspondence and biographical information. The material in the writing series includes drafts, notes, and proofs, among other documents, for Guy's published and unpublished writing. Professional papers consist of correspondence, grant applications, and materials related to professional organizations. less

The feature-length 16mm documentary James Baldwin: The Price of the Ticket, directed by Karen Thorsen in 1989, is an autobiographical portrait of writer and activist James Baldwin. Without using narration, the film allows Baldwin to tell his own story. It premiered on American Masters, a PBS show, in 1989. Since then, repeated PBS broadcasts have reached millions of people. The film received numerous awards and was honored at festivals in over two-dozen countries, including Sundance, London, Berlin, and Tokyo. Co-written and produced by Karen Thorsen and Douglas K. Dempsey, the film uses archival and original footage, including scenes from Baldwin's funeral service; explorations of his homes in France, Switzerland, Turkey, and Harlem; and on-camera interviews with close friends, colleagues, and critics including his brother David; biographer David Leeming; writers Maya Angelou, Amiri Baraka, William Styron, Ishmael Reed, and Yashar Kemal; painter Lucien Happersberger, and entertainer Bobby Short. This collection consists of material used to make the film including notebooks and binders prepared by the production crew documenting the resources acquired during film research; transcripts of interviews; research forms; stock footage research; book tour itineraries and promotional items; articles about Baldwin; FBI files on Baldwin; eulogies and memorials; and reviews. less

Born in Toledo, Ohio, activist, entrepreneur, and writer Kevin McGruder attended Harvard University (BA in Economics) and Columbia University (M.B.A. in Real Estate Finance). In 2007, he began his doctoral studies in History at the Graduate Center of the City University New York. In 1990, McGruder opened Home to Harlem, one of the first souvenir shops in Harlem, and currently co-owns Harlemade, a souvenir shop also located in Harlem. He was a board member of Other Countries, a black gay writers collective, and the executive director of Gay Men of African Descent (1997-2001). McGruder's essay, "Colleagues", appears in Other Countries' second journal, Sojourner: Black Gay Voices in the Age of AIDS; his essay, "I Hate Basketball", appears in Fighting Words: Personal Essays by Black Gay Men, edited by Charles Michael Smith, and his essay, "To Be Heard in Print: Black Gay Writers in the 1980s", appears in Obsidian III: Literature in the African Diaspora. The collection contains biographical and genealogical information for McGruder and his family; his writings; correspondence, business and financial records, promotional materials, and news clippings for Home to Harlem; minutes from board meetings, strategic plans, journals, membership information, newsletters, flyers, and news clippings related to McGruder's involvement with Other Countries and Gay Men of African Descent. less

Alan L. McLeod is emeritus professor of literature at Rider University, New Jersey, as well as a literary critic and editor of several volumes. McLeod researched and wrote about the life and work of Jamaican born, Harlem Renaissance writer Claude McKay from 1971-1992. His work on McKay includes editing The Negroes in America (1979), a work by McKay. The Claude McKay research collection (1971-1992) consists of printed material and photocopies of letters, poems, and articles from various manuscript collections. The printed material consists of copies of poems by McKay. The photocopies include letters from McKay to his daughter, Hope; William Stanley Braithwaite; Carl Cowl (Harvard University); Ivy and Harold Jackman; Arna Bontemps; Max Eastman; and Carl Van Vechten (Atlanta University). There is also a folder of McLeod writings on McKay, and a folder of articles about McKay by other authors. less

Ron Simmons, an early Black LGBTQ (Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, and Queer or Questioning) rights activist in the 1970s and 1980s. The Ron Simmons papers contain manuscripts for several of his writings, correspondence, research material, and material related to his professional work. less

African-American composer, musician, and arranger, Hall Johnson is best known as a choral director and for his arrangements of spirituals. In 1925, Johnson formed the Hall Johnson Negro Choir, which performed spirituals in the traditional style. The Hall Johnson Choir, which he organized in 1928, performed on Broadway in Marc Connolly's play Green Pastures (1930), for which Johnson was music director. Johnson was known for his compositions as well as the articles he authored that discussed the history of spirituals and their performance practice. The Hall Johnson Collection contains a miscellaneous assortment of material including correspondence and news clippings regarding a workshop Johnson held in East St. Louis, Missouri, in 1969; and a letter to Katherine Dunham explaining his need to give more time to the inexperienced chorus. There is a music book with some holographic music; a poem he authored "Changelessness" (1956); and a few notes. This collection also includes biographical notes and personal recollections written in 2001, by Madeline Preston, a friend and member of his choir, along with a letter Johnson wrote to her in 1956. less

The Wallace Bass Boyd collection is comprised of forty-seven journals, biographical accounts and geographical descriptions of Black life in the South, as well as drafts of his writings from 1985-2007. The journals primarily capture Boyd's day-to-day experiences spanning across his undergraduate, graduate, and post-graduate years. Four of the forty-seven journals are written to family members and aspiring artists. Notations about art and his artistic practice can also be found throughout the collection. less

Pearl Bailey (1918-1990) was an African American actress and singer. In films, she was known chiefly for two roles: Maria in Porgy and Bess(1959) and Frankie in Carmen Jones (1954). She was also known for her starring role on Broadway in an all-Black cast version of Hello Dolly. During World War II, Bailey toured with the USO, performing for American troops. Beginning in 1946, she was a top attraction in nightclubs, variety houses, and television programs in the United States and Britain. At age 67, in 1985, she graduated from Georgetown University with a bachelor's degree in theology. Between 1968 and 1989, she published six books on her life, cooking, and educational experiences. Bailey served as a special ambassador to the United Nations in 1975 and 1989, and in 1988, received the Presidential Medal of Freedom. The Pearl Bailey letters (1943-1989) consist of correspondence between Bailey and her friend, Lillian Morrison, a published author, compiler, and editor of children's and young adult books as well as a librarian at the New York Public Library, 110th Street Branch. Most of the letters were written by Bailey, and refer to her various endeavors, including her USO work at Fort Huachucha in Arizona; recordings of the song "Tired", which was one of her hit songs; Disney's The Fox and the Hound, for which she provided one of the voices; and her service with the United Nations. As both women were published authors, several of the letters make reference to this fact and to their long friendship and shared birthday, March 29, 1918. The letters do not provide a great amount of detail about Bailey's show business career. less

These interviews consist of six oral history interviews conducted by Theodore Kornweibel in 1970-1972, to provide firsthand accounts for his book No Crystal Stair: Black Life and the "Messenger," 1917-1928, published in 1975. The book examines the political, economic, and social alternatives available to Black people in the 1920s, including Garveyism, socialism, and trade union movements. Interviewees are: Arna Bontemps, James Ivy, Theophilus Lewis, Ernest Rice McKinney, A. Philip Randolph, and George S. Schuyler, all of whom either contributed articles to the Messenger or were on its board. less

This collection includes Witherspoon's published and unpublished poetry, including his best known works: An American Haiku Novel and On the Stair, both in his signature style of linked-haiku or renga. A travel journal kept in Africa, a critique of the Kenyan educational system, a play about the Black hijacker of a bus, an educational program report, various printed material, notebooks, and miscellaneous correspondence complete the collection. less

Father Divine (aka George Baker) was an African American religious leader and founder of the Peace Mission movement. The Father Divine collection consists primarily of material related to the broadcasting of Father Divine's sermons and messages over two radio stations. less

John A. Kenney, an African American physician, was a graduate of Hampton Institute and Leonard Medical School at Shaw University. From 1902-1924, he served as resident physician and director of Tuskegee Institute's Hospital and Nurse Training School and was a founder of the John A. Andrew Memorial Hospital, also in Tuskegee. Forced to leave Tuskegee, Kenney relocated to New Jersey, and with his own money, built the Kenney Memorial Hospital in Newark, New Jersey, to serve African Americans. This private hospital opened in 1927 and in 1934, Kenney converted it to a community hospital, renaming it the Community Hospital of Newark. Kenney was also the founder and editor of the National Medical Association Journal. The NMA is the largest and oldest organization representing African American physicians in the United States. Kenney died in 1950 at age 67. The John A. Kenney writings consist of seven addresses which Kenney presented to various academic bodies. The speeches cover his medical background and accomplishments at Tuskegee Institute, including the construction of an infantile paralysis unit at the John A. Andrew Memorial Hospital; his service for the National Medical Association; African Americans' contributions to surgery; and a description of the way that he used his personal investments to fund the construction of the Kenney Memorial Hospital and other medical causes. less

Best known for her performance in the title role of the original 1943-1944 Broadway production of Carmen Jones, Muriel Rahn (1911-1961) developed a reputation as a performer who was equally talented as a singer and an actress. The Muriel Rahn papers contain materials related to her performing career. less