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| W E B Dubois (1868-1963). Photo by Carl Van Vechtem. |
He earned a Ph.D. from Harvard in 1895, the first African-American to do so, with his dissertation on the slave trade, which Harvard published as the first in a series.
He continued his study of racism with his second book, The Philadelphia Negro: A Social Study (1899), which popularized Du Bois’s idea of “the talented tenth,” the one-out-of-ten probability that a black man will become a black leader.
In 1905, he met with 30 other African-American scholars, artists, and activists in Ontario, Canada, near Niagara Falls, to discuss the challenges facing people of color. (Blacks were not allowed rooms at white-run U.S. hotels.)
From this first meeting came the formation in 1909 of the NAACP, which pursued the goal of integrating blacks into the American middle class. John E. Milholland, the Irish-born father of Inez Milholland, became a friend of Du Bois and was the first Treasurer of the NAACP. He provided space and other resources for the NAACP office. Like Inez Milholland for a time, Du Bois was a declared socialist in 1910-12. He served as director of publicity and research for the NAACP from 1910 to 1934.
The alternative vision for American blacks was led by Booker T. Washington, who believed in the idea of a separate path of achievement for blacks. With a gift from Andrew Carnegie, Washington built up what became Tuskegee University. Washington lived for a while in Fort Salonga, Long Island.
Du Bois died in Nkrumah's Ghana in 1963. Nkrumah called him "a phenomenon."
From this first meeting came the formation in 1909 of the NAACP, which pursued the goal of integrating blacks into the American middle class. John E. Milholland, the Irish-born father of Inez Milholland, became a friend of Du Bois and was the first Treasurer of the NAACP. He provided space and other resources for the NAACP office. Like Inez Milholland for a time, Du Bois was a declared socialist in 1910-12. He served as director of publicity and research for the NAACP from 1910 to 1934.
The alternative vision for American blacks was led by Booker T. Washington, who believed in the idea of a separate path of achievement for blacks. With a gift from Andrew Carnegie, Washington built up what became Tuskegee University. Washington lived for a while in Fort Salonga, Long Island.
Du Bois died in Nkrumah's Ghana in 1963. Nkrumah called him "a phenomenon."
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