Collections of and about African American Women

Selected Primary Sources in the Sophia Smith Collection
and College Archives

Lillie Mae Bernice Alston (b. 1931). Manuscript about an African American childhood in Mississippi [in the Miscellaneous Manuscripts Collection - View finding aid].

Ames Family Papers (1844-2005). U.S. Army General Adelbert Ames was a white leader of Reconstruction in Mississippi: Provisional Governor in l868, U.S. Senator in l870, Governor in l874. The papers from this period consist of his official correspondence, his letters to Blanche (Butler) Ames during their courtship and the first years of their marriage, and her diary and letters to her mother. Some of the personal letters and part of the diary have been published in Chronicles of the Nineteenth Century: Family Letters of Blanche Butler and Adelbert Ames (l957).
View finding aid

Black Women Oral History Project [Schlesinger Library] (1976-1985). Transcripts of oral histories of 66 black women, most born before l9l0, who "have made strong impacts on their communities through their professions or through voluntary service."
View finding aid

Vivion Lenon Brewer (1900-1991), white leader of the Women's Emergency Committee to Open Our Schools, Little Rock, Arkansas. The papers (1948-91) contain organizational and historical records, clippings, newsletters, correspondence, plus a typescript of her Embattled Ladies of Little Rock.
View finding aid

Diana Davies, white activist, photojournalist, artist, and musician. Papers (1960s- ) include photographs of African American women and Civil Rights demonstrations of the 1960s.
View finding aid

Carte de visite of Sojourner Truth, undated. Photographer unknown. (Women's Rights Collection) This image is available in SSC Postcards

Garrison Family Papers (1773-1997) document the abolitionist and women's rights movements of three generations of nineteenth and early twentieth century white reformers: William Lloyd Garrison, Martha Coffin Wright, Lucretia Coffin Mott, James Mott, William Lloyd Garrison II, and Ellen Wright Garrison. There are letters by Frederick Douglass and references to Harriet Tubman and Sojourner Truth.
View finding aid

Mary Metlay Kaufman (1912-1995), white civil rights attorney, activist, and professor. Papers (1917-94) include documents related to her defense of Communist Party official Claudia Jones, as well as material related to her class on racism and the law, and some material on Angela Davis.
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Dorothy Kenyon (1888-1972), white attorney specializing in civil rights. The papers (1850-1998) contain legal briefs, correspondence, and notes for the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, and writings for the American Civil Liberties Union.
View finding aid

Constance Baker Motley (1921- ), attorney for the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, circa 1950s, and New York City and State official and Federal judge (1960s- ). The papers (1948-88) contain clippings from civil rights activities in Alabama and Mississippi, and an oral history.
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National Congress of Neighborhood Women (1975- ), grassroots organization for which the records (1976-97) include documentation of programs regarding education, employment and housing, implemented by and for poor and low-income women, including many women of color.
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Frances Fox Piven (1932- ), white academic and political activist whose focus has been on the impact of race, class and gender on policy decisions. Her papers (1957-99) include teaching materials, as well as material from the several organizations she has been associated with, including Mobilization for Youth, National Welfare Rights Organization, and HumanSERVE.
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Margaret Sanger Papers (1761-1995) and Florence Rose Papers (1832-1970). Portions of these collections relate to the Harlem Clinic of the Birth Control Clinical Research Bureau (1929-41) and the Negro Project of the Birth Control Federation of America (1939-42). The former contains reports, clippings, and correspondence. The latter contains reports and correspondence related to the BCFA's project to encourage birth control among African-American women in the South.
View Sanger finding aid; View Rose finding aid

N. Beatrice Worthy (1913- ), business executive with various organizations including Bell Laboratories, and AT&T, for which she was Affirmative Action coordinator. The papers (1954-77) consist of correspondence, writings, and printed material regarding her professional activities, and a closely related oral history interview done
in 1983-84.    View finding aid

Young Women's Christian Association Records (1860-2002).  Social service organization with a long-time focus on the elimination of racism and empowerment of women. Its initial work with African-American women and girls, known as it's "Colored Work," was in segregated Associations in cities and on the campuses of historically black colleges. Through the 1910s, the Association gradually shifted its approach, adopting a religious rationale for racial justice activities. This shift, combined with the dramatic expansion of the work with "colored" women during World War I, steered the National Association toward a focus on "interracial education" directed at the YWCA's white members and the public at large. It was hoped that these increased efforts, along with exposure through personal contact at interracial meetings, would gradually convince the white membership to make race relations a primary concern of the Association. The records include a wide array of program materials including skits, articles, newsletters, study outlines, and books to inform about the issues and offer effective techniques for group interracial work. In 1970, the Association adopted as its One Imperative, "the elimination of racism wherever it exists and by any means necessary."

Subject collections

The Minorities Collection includes printed materials relating to the status of women of color in the United States, dating from 1915 to 1983. Items of interest include unpublished position papers from the Wesleyan College Center for Research on Women; and reports from the Conference on the Educational and Occupational Needs of Black, Hispanic, Asian-Pacific American, American Indian, and White Ethnic Women (1976-78).
View finding aid

The Slavery/Anti-Slavery Collection primarily documents the efforts of American abolitionists from 1791 to 1865. Items include sale deeds of female slaves (1820 and 1858), photographs of emancipated slaves, early articles on African American history, and writings on the escaped slave William Wells Brown by W. Edward Farrison.
View finding aid

Periodicals

The Sophia Smith Collection has selected issues of The Anti-Slavery Standard, The Liberator (1833-65, incomplete), The Provincial Freeman (1853-57, microfilm), five issues of Aframerican Woman's Journal (l940-43), and small runs or single issues of many other titles.

Smith College Archives

Information about African-American students and faculty at Smith is limited and is scattered throughout the Archives, reflecting its varied sources. Few African-Americans attended Smith between l875 and l945, and the first African-American professor came in September l945. The kinds of records that might contain information about any student or faculty member (biographical files on individuals, correspondence about college policies, student organizational records, student letters, oral histories, and photographs) all include material that can be used by the persistent researcher to piece together a picture of African American students' experiences at Smith and race-related policies and attitudes in the college and the community. Concentrated research about an individual, activity, or policy is difficult without considerable use of supporting material from other sources.

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