The Negro Yearbook was an annual encyclopedia about African Americans, published at Tuskegee University from 1912 to 1952. This chapter details the growth of African American businesses since 1865.
The Negro Yearbook was an annual encyclopedia about African Americans, published at Tuskegee University from 1912 to 1952. This chapter focuses on the future of African American music.
The Negro Yearbook was an annual encyclopedia of the Negro published at Tuskegee University from 1912-1952. This chapter details the civil and political status of the Negro before 1865 to the early twentieth century.
The Negro Yearbooks was an annual encyclopedia of the Negro published at Tuskegee University from 1912-1952. This chapter describes the history of slavery, abolition and freedom in the United States from 1645 to 1865.
John Woodrow Wilson was a sculptor, painter, printmaker, and educator from Roxbury, MA. Negro Woman depicts a Black woman looking toward the distance from the side of her eyes. She is standing outside in a peach-colored shirt with the sun reflecting off of her face. Behind her are large buildings and a dark blue sky.
Elizabeth Catlett was an artist and educator from Washington, D.C., who was repatriated to Mexico. Negro Woman is a print depicting a dark-skinned woman looking off into the distance. The piece is in Black and white, aside from her brown face. The woman is wearing a jacket pinned at the collar, an undershirt, and a straw hat.
Elizabeth Catlett was an artist and educator from Washington, D.C., who repatriated to Mexico. Negro Woman is a wooden sculpture of a Black woman. Catlett crafts the woman with an intense stare through careful sculpting and inlaid onyx eyes.
Robert Blackburn was a notable printmaker from Summit, NJ who grew up in Harlem, NY. Negro Mother depicts a Black woman with a sorrowful expression. Balckburn uses geometric shapes to emphasize her features adn the details of the background.
Dr. Eddie Jordan, Sr. was a Southern artist from Wichita Falls, TX. Negro Girl Skipping Rope depicts a young Black girl in the process of playing jump rope. The rope is positioned over her head as she prepares to hop over the rope with one leg lifted.
Ellison's painting is a nature scene featuring a bisected tree stump, with untamed growth all around it. At the bottom of the painting, there are several seashells, which the artist enhanced with raised, textural elements. Ellison graduated from Texas Southern University in 1972.
This statement to the President of the United States, Richard M. Nixon, was created by the association of 111 members with Florida A&M President Dr. Benjamin L. Perry, Jr., serving as a member of the Board of Directors and one of 15 members who had a conference with the former. It discusses equal opportunity and race relations in education.
Nancy Stewart worked in the central office of the Child Development Group of Mississippi (CDGM) in Jackson, Mississippi, from 1967 until 1970. She talks about growing up during segregation in Gulfport, Mississippi, and the views that many people had about Head Start serving Black children. Interview is incomplete. Recording cuts short at the end.
Nancy Cahill moved from Washington D.C., with her parents in 1948 when she was six years old and had lived in Clinton most of her life. In the interview she talks about her family's history in Clinton, MS, dating back to the 19th century; the town's rapid growth; her education; how Clinton compares and contrasts with Jackson; and racism in Clinton.
One of the most prominent symbols of Florida A&M includes Lee Hall, north of the Eternal Flame, which sits squarely in the middle of the campus quad. This newspaper clipping describes the $300,000 administrative building and how its namesake, former FAMU president J. R. E. Lee.
A document expressing the NAACP’s desires for the adoption of an amendment that will end poll tax not just within Macon County, AL but the entire state of Alabama.
This terracotta features a snail-like creature with long legs, adorned with spiraled embellishments for the eyes and outer shell. The spiral motifs are placed in a symmetrical pattern on both sides of this sculpture. The clay is mixed with grog to create a better texture and prevent the terracotta from shrinking when fired.
Samples’ mural unfolds like a dream, with each panel above the sleeping artist revealing a constellation of scenes from the artist’s youth. Lower window panels evoke a harmonious existence with nature and animals, while upper panels reveal struggles with racism in the South and his mother’s death.
Irene V. Clark was a diasporic folklore artist from Washington, D.C. My Great, Great, Great, Great Grandfather's Cousin is a cubist portrait of a Black string musician wearing a cape and turban. Clark creates a symmetrical arch framing the subject and a perched hummingbird.
James H. Malone was a graphic artist, cartoonist, writer, and painter from Winterville, GA. My Classmate is a portrait drawing of a young Black boy in a school uniform. He sits in a chair with his hands on his lap, looking at the bottom left corner.
Tinker’s painting is a study of a section of her Hannah Hall mural. It depicts a naked woman bending over in front of a large globe. On the right side, the progression of human development, from embryo to fetus, is depicted. The final version of the mural features all of the pictured elements, but aligned differently and complemented by many additional images.
Sampson’s mural study depicts Mother Nature surrounded by birds, turtles, trees, fossils, and an expansive blue sky. This piece is painted in a geometric style that appears frequently in the work of students of Dr. John T. Biggers during the mid to late 1970s. Apart from some minor changes, Sampson’s final mural replicates the design in this earlier draft.
Oliver’s drawing is of a man looking upwards. This is a pre-sketch for a mural in Hannah Hall, which has a matching version with a woman and child. Oliver would find small spaces between other students’ murals and fill in the gaps with his own compositions. As a result, Oliver painted 6 murals in the building; no other student artist painted more than 2.
Williams’ painting is a pre-study for his mural. Across three scenes, the artist portrays birth, family home life, and farm work. This triptych style of composition appears frequently in the murals painted by students of Dr. John T. Biggers. The checkerboard motif that Williams uses in each panel is also drawn from Biggers’ teaching. Although Texas Southern is an urban university, many students hail from rural areas in Texas and these themes of country life appear repeatedly in student murals.
Word’s painting is a partial pre-study of his Hannah Hall mural. The painting, featuring a family in a small room with a fireplace, washboard, mounted gun, and radio, is done in a geometric style frequently seen in the art of Biggers’ students from the late 1970s and early 1980s. Word’s full mural design includes adjacent panels depicting a church, an abstract figure with a bubble-like head, and an homage to the Wizard of Oz.
Biggers created this sketch while working on his mural, “The Contributions of the Negro Woman to American Life and Education,” for the Blue Triangle Branch of the YWCA. This mural was the culmination of his research for his doctoral dissertation at Penn State University. It features Harriet Tubman and Sojourner Truth leading enslaved people to freedom and educating African Americans, respectively.
Samples' painting is a study of his mural created in Hannah Hall. The design unfolds like a dream, with each panel above the central figure (the artist himself), who is asleep on a table, revealing a constellation of scenes from the artists’ youth. Lower window panels evoke a harmonious existence with nature and animals, while upper panels reveal struggles with racism in the South and his mother’s death. The shadowy dogs along the sides of the study were not included in the final mural.
Settles' mural study depicts muscular, mostly naked men and women seemingly being sucked into a portal. An angel attempts to pull them away, while two men are stripped of their skin and bones. The figures’ hair is painted with great detail and seems imbued with special powers. The backdrop shows a horizon of shotgun homes. Settles’ final mural nearly replicates this earlier draft.
Curnell’s painting is a pre-study of her mural “Awakening” in Hannah Hall. The mural shows a reflection of Curnell’s past, present, and future life. She is seen pictured here as an infant, at her current age, and her future self as an elder. The quilt that stretches across the composition features various religious symbols, including the cross, the star of David, and the ankh.
This is a maquette created by an unknown Texas Southern University art student. This maquette displays a stout figure with various swirls on the body. The swirls are a required component for the maquette project, as Carroll Harris Simms pushed his students to richly embellish their works.
