African American Studies Primary Sources: Twentieth Century

An early group of materials by Baldwin, including manuscripts, correspondence, artworks and personal papers. Among the manuscripts are drafts of a novel, "Crying Holy", which evolved much later into Baldwin's first published novel, "Go Tell It On the Mountain."

Arna Bontemps was a teacher and writer whose novel God Sends Sunday appeared at the end of the Harlem Renaissance in 1931. He continued writing and editing anthologies and served as librarian at Fisk University. The papers contains materials documenting the life of Arna Bontemps, including Series I, Correspondence , and Series II, Writings.

Countee Cullen gained fame principally as a poet, during the Harlem Renaissance, and later taught in the New York City school system.

The Zora Neale Hurston Collection contains Correspondence, Writings, including drafts of her autobiography, Dust Tracks on the Road, the novel, Their Eyes Were Watching God, and a play written in collaboration with Langston Hughes, "Mule Bone," as well as a study of Hurston written in 1972 by Robert Hemenway.

Johnson was involved in a number of significant movements and organizations during his lifetime, and, as a result, the Papers also provide insight into broader topics in American and African American history during the twentieth century.

The James Weldon Johnson Memorial Collection Pamphlets File highlights the achievements of individual African Americans, the work of community and education organizations, and areas such as film, theater, music, politics, and civil rights. See also: Johnson (James Weldon) Memorial Collection Clippings File JWJ 2x.

Series I, Personal Correspondence , contains the bulk of the letters received by Hughes during his lifetime. Hughes took much interest in the careers of younger African American, African, Caribbean, and Central American writers such as: Leroi Jones; Ted Joans, and Alice Walker.

The Claude McKay Collection consists of correspondence, writings, personal papers, photographs and memorabilia documenting the life and work of Claude McKay.

The Wallace Thurman Collection contains Correspondence, (including letters from Langston Hughes), Writings, primarily versions of Aunt Hagar's Children and the musical play Harlem, written with William Jourdan Rapp, and Personal Papers.

The papers contain correspondence, drafts of unpublished books, essays, and other writings, together with personal papers documenting Toomer's life, primarily after his Harlem Renaissance period, and papers on Marjory Latimer Toomer. Correspondents include Charles Dupee, Waldo Front, Mabel Dodge Luhan, Margaret Naumberg, and Russell S. Walcott.

One of the major patrons of the Harlem Renaissance. This collection contains correspondence, writings, personal papers, scrapbooks and photographs.

Contains manuscripts, correspondence with other writers such as Nelson Algren, Arna Bontemps, Ralph Ellison, Chester Himes, Langston Hughes, Gunnar Myrdal and Margaret Walker, photographs, financial and legal documents and printed materials relating to the life and work of Richard Wright. Included are drafts of such works as Black Boy and Native Son, photographs of trips to Spain and Ghana, various items of personal memorabilia such as Wright's Spingarn Medal, and a film of Wright's screen test.