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Creator
Armstrong, Winifred
Call number
Sc MG 648
Physical description
16.21 linear feet (17 boxes)
Language
English
Preferred Citation
[Item], Winifred Armstrong files on U.S. Relations in Africa, Sc MG 648, Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, Manuscripts, Archives and Rare Books Division, The New York Public Library
Repository
Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, Manuscripts, Archives and Rare Books Division
Access to materials
Request an in-person research appointment.

The Winifred Armstrong files on Relations in Africa reflect her work on establishing formal relationships between various African nations and the United States. The files contain correspondence, journals, research material on various countries, printed matter, reports, conference proceedings, and meeting minutes.

Biographical/historical information

The following text was written by Winifred Armstrong--

DOB: February 22, 1930, in Manhattan; Mother: Winifred Pritchard Armstrong; Father: Robert Helms Armstrong; Brother: Robert Pritchard Armstrong (1935-)

I remember as a first-grader in Colonial School in Pelham, New York, reading a book about fellow six-year-olds Kofi in Ghana, Hans in Holland, and Jing in China, and forever since feeling myself part of a wider world from which I wanted to continue to learn and share.

As editor of the newspaper at Pelham High School (class of 1947), I wrote about the then new Experiment in International Living, a post-World War II program for young Americans to live summers with families overseas. At Swarthmore College, I took economics, psychology, and political science, aiming to understand the connections (and disconnections) among these fields as they play out in society. The race relations club ran a survey, which I oversaw, with the Swarthmore community to address issues of discrimination in the town. In 1949–1950, I spent a rewarding junior year at Indiana University in Bloomington. After graduation at Swarthmore (1951), I saved money from my $55 per week starting salary at the National Conference of Christians and Jews, and lived with a roommate in a one-bedroom apartment at 315 West 106th St (rent $110 a month). After five years in successive jobs (see resumes in file), with about $4000 in hand, I chose to go abroad over graduate school, and set off in October 1956, for Europe and Africa.

I spent three months in the U.K., France, and Belgium, meeting people in education, economics, business, labor, and academia who could give me information and contacts in the countries in Africa where (as colonial countries) they had experience. In 1956, in the U.S., there were very few people who had knowledge or experience in Africa: a few missionaries with knowledge of specific regions and a few travel agents who knew the port cities. The U.S. State Department dealt with London, Brussels, Paris, and Lisbon as the capitals of the colonial countries, but they did not have a section on Africa or direct contacts in Africa (except South Africa, Liberia, Ethiopia, and Egypt, which were independent.) Very few American NGOs had contacts in Africa, Peace Corps had yet to be established, and few American companies had investments or operations in the colonial countries. Additionally, there were only a small number of African students in American universities. I thought that it would be important for Americans to begin having direct contact with people of all races in Africa who were also working in education, economic and community development, business and labor, and politics and the arts. I hoped to learn enough about education and economic development in the countries I visited at least to begin some conversations at home.

In early 1957, my brother and I shipped the Volkswagen I had bought in Geneva from Morocco to West Africa. We arrived in time for the March 6, 1957, celebration of independence in Ghana (formerly the Gold Coast). Wonderful! There is a picture of me in Life Magazine at the first Miss Ghana contest where the final came down to a choice between "Miss Togo" (from Togo province, not the adjoining country), who was traditionally plump and attractive, and the other candidate, who was slim and modern and more Western in dress. As I recall, Miss Togo won that year.

My brother Bob traveled with me in West Africa, mainly in Ghana and Nigeria, until he left to go back to Yale University around May 1957. I continued to travel and meet and talk with people in Ghana, Nigeria, Togo, and Dahomey (now Benin) mainly by Volkswagen, carrying a camp bed so I could stay in villages. I also stayed in missions and schools and with families who were white and black, well off and poor, until January 1958. I sold the car (for about $900) and used the proceeds to travel the rest of the way around Africa. Altogether we put about 20,000 miles on the car.

I flew to Leopoldville (now Kinshasa), staying mostly at the University as I recall, then to Johannesburg. I stayed in South Africa for several months, traveling by train, bus, and car and meeting African, Indian, English, and Afrikaans people. From there, I traveled to Southern Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe), Northern Rhodesia (now Zambia), Tanganyika (now Tanzania), Kenya, Uganda, Sudan, Egypt, Greece, and Europe, and I returned home by Christmas 1958.

Everywhere I met with people who were working (professionally, politically, or socially) toward the greater independence or development of their countries and not always in agreement with each other. I took notes on most conversations (in an abbreviated English called speedwriting), which can be found in the notebooks of the 1957-1958 trip. It was my intention to find ways to build the political, educational, economic, and cultural connections between the U.S. and the African countries. I hoped that by identifying people in those countries, who were working in those domains and put them in touch with counterparts here, it would develop working relationships.

By the time I returned in late 1958, the U.S. State Department had established a section on Africa. Few knew much, and I could, and often did help, with introductions of African visitors, who began to come to the U.S. in greater numbers than heretofore. In 1959, a former colleague, Ernie LeFever, who was working for Senator Hubert Humphrey, suggested I meet Ted Sorensen, Chief of Staff for Senator John Kennedy, who had just taken over the chairmanship of the Senate Foreign Relations Subcommittee on Africa. Kennedy was planning to make his first speech on Africa within a couple of months. Ted asked if I would like to draft such a speech, and I accepted, which led to work that lasted until the Senator became the President in January 1961. Much of that work, which included drafting speeches, creating policy backgrounds, setting up meetings with visitors from Africa, and getting the State Department to acknowledge the discrimination in housing affecting new African diplomats, amongst other tasks, came at my suggestion. I also worked on developing the Peace Corps idea, and wrote and contributed to policy papers for the television debates and the transition team. Kennedy was terrific in absorbing information and using it to further his conversations with visitors. My Kennedy files are indexed and available (and being used) in the Kennedy Library in Boston. Some related materials also are in the Schomburg files.

Much of my career has been generating ideas for and with organizations about programs they could undertake – the files go from African American Chamber of Commerce (which I helped found and for which I provided speakers) to the YMCA/YWCA (with whose personnel in U.S. and Africa I worked). Much of this work developed from personal interest or friendships, in Africa and the U.S.; in effect, my role was more of a volunteer or consultant. Intermittently, I have been employed to take on a project, book, or supportive organizing role. The files, articles, and resumes touch on these roles. Also in the files are political and diplomatic stories. Because we knew each other from my Africa trip, I helped arrange contacts, for example, for the early U.S. trips of Kenneth Kaunda, when he was a relatively unknown (here) political leader in Northern Rhodesia before becoming Zambia's first president, and for Julius Nyerere, first president of Tanganyika (now Tanzania). I also suggested and organized briefings on Africa for Congressional staff and many other groups.

Out of the continuing friendships also came opportunities for me to offer or be asked informally and quietly to set up opportunities for people in diplomatic stand-offs to talk with each other. Around my dining room table have taken place discussions between Northern and Southern Sudanese, Nigerians and Biafrans, and various Southern African representatives when there was no prior formal venue. Many of the people I have known, and their families, have continued to play a role in my life. I say that "Africa is part of my formation", meaning that African ways of thought and being have become part of my ways of perceiving the world. While the files cover primarily the late 1950s–late 1970s, the character of the contacts has continued as I have gone on to work in other fields and with other organizations. I hope the resume file reflects this continuing commitment, and that the indexing of the files will facilitate researchers finding others' stories as well.

Scope and arrangement

The Winifred Armstrong files on relations in Africa reflect her work on establishing formal relationships between various African nations and the United States. Much of her work occurred during various trips to Africa, including her initial African trip, which was self-motivated, and subsequent trips, many of which were sponsored by organizations, such as the United Nations. Some of the material, however, is derived from her work with various organizations in the United States and abroad, either as an employee, freelance worker, or volunteer, such as her work with the State Department and the National Planning Association (NPA). The bulk of the material dates from the late 1950s-early 1970s, and consists of correspondence, printed matter, conference proceedings, research material, personal journals, and meeting minutes. Winifred Armstrong was a driving force in forging relationships between the United States and various African nations; in many cases, there had been no formal connections prior to her networking. Her files not only reflect the determination and savvy that she used to forge relationships with local Africans and Africans in high levels of government, but also the resolve she used upon returning to the United States to have these relationships acknowledged, continued, and enhanced.

The Winifred Armstrong files on U.S. Relations in Africa is arranged in seven series:

  • Personal and biographical
    1958-2012

    This series focuses on Armstrong's personal life and projects. It is divided into four subseries; the first subseries, general, includes information such as resumes, cover letters, address lists, passports, and guest books. The guest books include the names of students, friends, and co-workers with whom she worked or knew in Africa. They also provide evidence of some of the associations with which she worked. Personal correspondence, the second subseries, includes letters to friends and family; these letters include introductions on behalf of Armstrong to contacts in Africa prior to her first trip. Additionally, many of these letters are from Armstrong to her family during this first trip, while later letters are correspondence between her and various friends she made in Africa over the years, including Tom Mboya. The projects subseries consists of documents related to various personal projects on which she worked or for which she advocated, including placement of African nationals in U.S. jobs and schools and assisting Francis Bebey, a musician and friend from Cameroon, with the promotion of his music in the U.S. The final subseries, writing, contains various articles, speeches, and reports that she wrote over the years, some on behalf of others, such as speeches that she wrote for John F. Kennedy, and others that she wrote independently, such as "Africa and American Policy Choices" for The Intercollegian.

  • Trips
    1954-1974

    This series consists of material related to the various trips to Africa that Armstrong took over the years. It is arranged into four subseries; the first subseries covers her first trip to Africa. It includes correspondence in preparation for her trip, contact lists of people and places in Africa, and travel logs. The second subseries encompasses the trip that she took on behalf of the National Planning Association; Armstrong was employed as a researcher to work on a study of indigenous enterprise in African countries. The material in this subseries includes memos, correspondence, and reports consulted before her trip; it also includes correspondence, notes, reports, travel logs, and contact lists written during her trip. Throughout this trip, she sent reports of her progress to the NPA and the Agency for International Development (AID), with whom she worked closely; her research and findings were then published in the book, The Development of African Private Enterprise: A Report, written with Theodore Geiger (1964). The book discusses the role of foreign companies and African government in stimulating African entrepreneurship and provides suggestions on how the U.S. can improve its aid to African entrepreneurs to ensure that Africans can benefit equally in private and public enterprises. Subseries four consists of material related to Armstrong's trip sponsored by the United Nations Special Fund; as a consultant in East Africa, she was tasked with exploring various forms of enterprise in different sectors (industrial, commercial, and agricultural) in order to strengthen and stimulate local initiatives. This material consists of correspondence with contacts at the United Nations, notes, research material (such as studies and reports on industry in specific countries), and final reports. The last subseries contains information on two other trips, one sponsored by the International Labour Office (ILO) and the other by the African-American Institute's Educators to Africa Association. The former trip involved Armstrong's participation as an expert on entrepreneurship; she worked with three others in Zambia to establish a Management and Vocational Training Center. The latter trip involved Armstrong's work as a member of the Visit Africa Program. The material in these files consists of correspondence, notes, memos and reports.

  • Countries
    1949-1979

    This series consists of country-specific material, not necessarily related to or generated from Armstrong's trips but from her work in Africa in general. Each country's file or files contains one or more of the following: correspondence, notes, reports, meeting minutes, and printed matter (newsletters, newspaper clippings, articles, and bulletins, among others). Many of the documents were generated by various divisions of the United Nations, the U.S. government, and country embassies. Some of this material was produced by the government of the country or an organization within the country, while others were produced by non-governmental organizations or non-profit institutions in the United States. For example, in the Angola section, there is a report from the U.S. Department of Agriculture on the agricultural economies of countries in Eastern and Southern Africa. In addition, there are copies of various issues of La Voix de la Nation Angolaise, a newspaper published in the Belgian Congo that promoted independence for Angola from Portugal. Interspersed throughout this material are notes by Armstrong and letters to and from Armstrong on behalf of different organizations; in one instance, she wrote a letter to the Portuguese embassy on behalf of a group meeting to discuss Angola at American University (1962). In another instance, in 1960, Armstrong wrote a memo to Senator Humphrey's office about the food situation in the Congo; she most likely wrote this when she was working for Kennedy. Many of the countries are referred to with past names, ones that they had before independence or actual formation.

  • Conferences
    1957-1981

    This series contains information about conferences on topics related to Africa or occurring in African countries. The material includes schedules, participant lists, conference programs, abstracts of papers delivered, the papers themselves, and correspondence. Armstrong assisted in the development of some of these conferences, such as the Conference on African Resources, in which she also participated; others she attended, such as the Conference on National Reconstruction and Development in Nigeria, and still others were of interest to her or an organization with which she worked and/or consulted.

  • Organizations
    1956-2007

    As an expert on African enterprise and development in general, Armstrong worked with numerous organizations, either as a consultant, employee, freelancer, member, or in some cases, a volunteer. These organizations ranged from governmental agencies, such as the U.S. State Department, to non-profit organizations and academic associations. For example, as a member of the American Committee on Africa, Armstrong received mailings and publications. In addition, she helped the organization create connections with politicians and secure printed material on various African countries. Another organization, the American Council on Education, provided Armstrong with a working paper on educational development in Northern Rhodesia, Nyasaland, and Southern Rhodesia (1962) and requested her feedback on a memo entitled, "Some African Views on Higher Educational Development" (1963). Other organizations, such as B'nai B'rith Women, invited Armstrong to participate in eventsin a roundtable discussion while others provided material for Armstrong's research through publications and mailings. Most of the material in this series consists of printed matter published by each organization, reports, memos, meeting minutes, and in some cases where indicated, correspondence.

  • Publications
    1954-1980

    This series includes various publications such as books, academic papers, articles, journals, and newspapers on topics related to Africa. Not all of the material has been published, such as in the case of certain reports and papers, which were delivered only at conferences or meetings. These publications were most likely used by Armstrong as research for her work in Africa. While she requested copies of many of the publications, many publications were sent to her on behalf of various organizations.

  • Subject files
    1954-1979

    This last series mainly contains printed matter (articles, clippings, reports, and studies) on various topics, most related to Africa but some unrelated. Most likely this material was used by Armstrong as research for her work in Africa.

Administrative information

Source of acquisition

Gift of Winifred Armstrong, 1998, 2004, and 2017.

Processing information

Initially processed by Jhanaya Belle and Miranda Mims in 2017; processing completed by Lauren Stark in September 2018.

Separated material

Transferred to the Photographs and Prints Division: About 70 loose photographs and a few negatives

Related Material

Winifred Armstrong Personal Papers, John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum; Winifred Armstrong papers, Hoover Institution Archives

Using the collection

Location

Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, Manuscripts, Archives and Rare Books Division
515 Malcolm X Boulevard, New York, NY 10037-1801
Second Floor