Universities in St. Louis Establish Online Resource on Ferguson Protests
The Regional Collecting Initiative on Ferguson is assembling information, oral histories, photographs, new stories, and other items to document the people and events surrounding the shooting of Michael Brown by a Ferguson police officer.
New Historical Archive of Materials Concerning the Murder of Emmett Till
David W. Houck, a professor in the College of Communication and Information at Florida State University has created an archive of materials concerning the Emmett Till case. The archive will be available to researchers in 2016.
Civil Rights Is a Key Element of an Archival Project of Sermons Given at...
Many of the sermons given at the Duke University Chapel dating from the 1950s and 1960s touch on issues of race and the civil rights movement. Recordings and transcripts of these sermons are now being digitized for researchers.
Bryn Mawr College Honors Its First Black Alumna
Bryn Mawr College in suburban Philadelphia has named its new residence hall to honor Enid Cook. Cook was not permitted to live on campus but graduated in 1931 with degrees in chemistry and biology.
Middlebury College Houses a Vast Archive of Abolitionist Letters
The archive contains the letters of four generations of the Robinson family. Rowland Thomas Robinson and Rachel Gilpin Robinson were devout Quakers, who were among the earliest abolitionists in the state of Vermont.
University of Louisville Honors Its First Black Educator
The University of Louisville has renamed its Freedom Park to honor Dr. Charles H. Parrish Jr. In 1951, Professor Parrish, who held a Ph.D. in sociology from the University of Chicago, became the first Black educator to teach at the university.
Oral History Interviews of 1960s Graduates of Alcorn State University Are Now Available
The oral history interviews were conducted in 2015 with 13 individuals who graduated from the university between 1960 and 1969. The topics discussed are academic and residence life, athletics, and the students participation in the civil rights movement.
University of Nebraska Upgrades Its Website on Slaves in 1860s Washington, D.C.
The University of Nebraska's online project documenting nineteenth-century slaves' efforts to win their freedom through the District of Columbia's court system has been upgraded with new tools and information.
Southern University’s Slave Narrative Archives Are Now Available Online
The archives are a series of letters and documents of interviews with slaves that focus on the thoughts of slaves about slave owners, abuse, clothing, religious life, superstitions and religion in their communities.
Task Force Considers Changing Name of the Stadium at the University of Maryland
Student groups have called on the university to strip the name of H.C. Byrd from the on-campus stadium. The students say that Byrd, who was president of the university from 1935 to 1954, "barred Blacks from participating in sports and enrolling into the University until 1951."
Middlebury College Names New Intercultural Center After Two Early Black Alumni
The new Anderson Freeman Resource Center was named after Mary Annette Anderson, the valedictorian of the Class of 1889 and Martin Henry Freeman of the Class of 1849 who later became president of Liberia College.
A Haunting Photographic Essay on Morris Brown College
The University of Georgia Press has published a striking new book chronicling the troubles of historically Black Morris Brown College in Atlanta.
The University of Montana’s “Six-Word Essays” on Race
Students in the School of Journalism at the University of Montana are asking all 47,000 students at the 16 state university campuses and seven tribal colleges to submit a six-word essay on the topic of race.
Emory University Professor Resurrects the History of America’s Great Black Jockey
Pellom McDaniels III, an assistant professor of African American studies, is the author of a biography of Isaac Burns Murphy, one of the greatest jockeys in horse racing history. Largely due to Dr. Daniels' efforts, the City of Lexington, Kentucky, recently held a five-day celebration honoring Murphy.
Conference on Preserving Slave Records Held at Vanderbilt University
The scholars who work on digital preservation projects in Cuba, Brazil, Sierra Leone, Colombia, Haiti, and the United States gathered to discuss strategies and methods for preserving records pertaining to slavery and making them available to researchers and the general public.
Colleges Removing Reminders of the Confederacy From Campus
The University of Mississippi has taken down the official flag of the State of Mississippi because it has a Confederate battle flag in one corner. Bowdoin College in Maine is ending a scholarship honoring Jefferson Davis and returning the endowed fund to the United Daughters of the Confederacy.
Vanderbilt Honors the Man Who Integrated Southeastern Conference Athletics
Vanderbilt University in Nashville, Tennessee, is establishing the Perry E. Wallace Scholarship to honor the first African American to play a varsity sport in the Southeastern Conference.
Emory Offering a MOOC on the Strategies of the Civil Rights Movement
The course, "From Freedom Rides to Ferguson: Narratives of Nonviolence in the American Civil Rights Movement," will be taught by Bernard LaFayette Jr., a distinguished scholar in residence at Emory University.
Bowdoin College Renovates Home of Harriet Beecher Stowe
The author of Uncle Tom's Cabin lived in the home from 1850 to 1852 during which time she wrote the book that became the best-selling novel of the nineteenth century.
Duke University Acquires Marcus Garvey Papers Collection
The collection includes the papers and research documents used by Professor Robert A. Hill to compose the 12-volume Marcus Garvey and Universal Negro Improvement Association Papers.
Mississippi State Debuts New Website on Civil Rights Era in Starkville
The website, entitled "A Shaky Truce: Starkville Civil Rights Struggles, 1960-1980," includes oral history interviews, photographs, and documents on the history of the university and the city, school desegregation, and the civil rights movement.
University of North Carolina Asheville Acquires African American Photographic Archive
The Special Collections and University Archives has acquired an archive of more than 1,000 photographs of the African American community in Asheville from the 1950s through the 1970s.
Georgetown Renames Two Buildings on Campus That Honored Men With Ties to Slavery
Georgetown University in Washington, D.C., has announced that it is changing the names of two buildings on campus. Mulledy Hall and McSherry Hall were both named after former presidents of the university who had participated in the slave trade.
Harvard Law Students Protest the School’s Seal
The students say that the seal, depicting three bushels of wheat, is an image taken from the family seal of Isaac Royall Jr. who donated his estate to endow the first professorship in law at Harvard. Royall owned slaves and was a slave trader.
Rutgers University to Examine Its History Relating to Race
Richard Edwards, chancellor of the flagship campus of Rutgers University in New Brunswick, announced that in conjunction with the 250th anniversary of the educational institution's founding, the university has formed a "Committee on Enslaved and Disenfranchised Populations in Rutgers History."
Frederick Douglass Statue Placed on University of Maryland Campus
The statue of abolitionist Frederick Douglass is eight-feet tall and is mounted on a three-foot tall base. It weighs about 1,000 pounds. The statue was designed in Ireland and cast in bronze in Wales.
New Online Archive to Document History of Black World War I Veterans
The new website being put together by faculty and students at the Reed College of Media at West Virginia University will allow users to visit memorials to Black veterans around the world through virtual reality.
University of Iowa Receives Archives of a Veteran of Freedom Summer
Eric Morton, who was a coordinator for the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee in Mississippi during the 1964 Freedom Summer voter registration drive, became friends with students from the University of Iowa who came South to help in the effort.
The Fordham Bronx African American History Project Is Now Available Online
The Fordham Bronx African American History Project includes downloadable audio files and verbatim transcripts of 300 oral history interviews conducted between 2002 and 2013.
When Harvard President Drew Faust Used Morehouse College as a Safe Haven
In 1965 Drew Gilpin Faust, now president of Harvard University, traveled south to participate in the civil rights movement. Apprehensive about driving a car with northern license plates during tumultuous times, she spent the night in a parking lot at Morehouse College.
University of Kentucky Covers a Mural Showing Slaves in a Tobacco Field
The University of Kentucky has decided to cover up a mural in the atrium of Memorial Hall that shows slaves working in a tobacco field. The mural, which is 38 feet wide and 11 feet tall, will remain covered until the university decides how and where the artwork will be preserved.
Winthrop University Will No Longer Give Out the Tillman Award
Winthrop University has announced that the university's top academic prize for students will no longer be named after "Pitchfork Ben" Tillman, a former segregationist governor of South Carolina and U.S. Senator.
Tufts University Opens Archives of Rubin ‘Hurricane’ Carter to Researchers
Carter was a middleweight boxer who spent 19 years in prison after being convicted of a triple murder in Paterson, New Jersey. The convictions were later overturned by a federal court.
Duke to Further Recognize the Black Man Who Designed Many Buildings on Its Campus
Julian Abele designed many of the Gothic buildings on the campus of Duke University in Durham, North Carolina. But because of his race, the university did not originally celebrate the architect of many of its most important structures.
University of Maryland Renames Stadium That Had Honored an Opponent of Racial Integration
The board of regents of the University of Maryland System has agreed to rename Byrd Stadium as Maryland Stadium. Student protesters noted that during Byrd’s tenure as president of the university he barred Blacks from enrolling at the University until 1951.
Alice Randall’s Class at Vanderbilt University Explores the History of Blacks in Country Music
Alice Randall, the award-winning author, songwriter, and writer-in-residence in African American and diaspora studies, taught a class that used mapping technology to trace the progress of African Americans in country music.
