Arna Wendell Bontemps: Fisk University Librarian, Poet, and Author

Arna W. Bontemps (1902-1973), a native of Alexandria, Louisiana, was the first African American to serve as University Librarian for Fisk University (1943-1965). Mr. Bontemps, a 1943 graduate of the University of Chicago Library School, was also an author, poet, and a member of the Omega Psi Phi fraternity. He passed away in 1973.

See related post: Marcus Bruce Christian (1900-1976), Louisiana Librarian

Sources: "The Negro Writer in the United States: University of  California at Berkley Plays Host to Five-Day Seminar on Negro Literature." Ebony 20.1 (1964): 126, 131-132, 134. Print. ; Jordan, Casper Leroy, and Josey, E.J. "A Chronology of Events in Black Librarianship." Handbook of Black Librarianship. Ed. E.J. Josey and Marva L. DeLoach. 2nd ed. Lanham: Scarecrow, 2000. 7. Print. ; "Arna Bontemps Named to Library Board." Jet 4.9 (1953): 51. Print. ; "Fisk's Famed Librarian, Bontemps, Moves Out of Post." Jet 28.13 (1965): 25. Print. ; "Author Arna Bontemps Dies Reading Rosary at Wake of Meharry Physician's Wife." Jet 44.13 (1973): 44. Print. ; Campbell, Dorothy Wilson. "Curators of African American Collections." The Black Librarian in the Southeast: Reminiscences, Activities, Challenges. Ed. Annette L. Phinazee. Durham: NCCU School of Library Science, 1980. 191. Print. ; Shockley, Ann Allen. "Special Collections, Fisk University Library." Library Quarterly 58.2 (1988): 151, 154. Print. ; Sinnette, Elinor D. V.  Arthur Alfonso Schomburg, Black Bibliophile & Collector: A Biography. New York: New York Public Library, 1989. 115, 129. Print. ; Jones, Kirkland C. Renaissance Man from Louisiana: A Biography of Arna Wendell Bontemps. Westport: Greenwood, 1992. Print. ; Jefferson, Julius C. “The Black Male Librarian: An Endangered Species.” The National Diversity in Libraries Conference. Louisville Marriott Downtown, Louisville, KY. 3 Oct. 2008. Pdf.


Update 09/13/2012:

An additional article on Arna Wendell Bontemps:

Thompson, John Downing. "African Americans and Education: A Study of Arna Bontemps."  Syracuse University Library Associates Courier 33, [paper 342] (2001): 77-99. Print.

Update 11/17/2015:

Arna Wendell Bontemps is mentioned in a piece I wrote on Fisk University:

Fenton, Michele. "Fisk University." African American Leadership: A Concise Reference Guide. Ed. Tyson King-Meadows. [Santa Barbara, CA]: Mission Bell Media, 2015. 93-94. Print.

Marcus Bruce Christian (1900-1976), Louisiana Librarian

Marcus Bruce Christian (1900-1976) was assistant librarian at Dillard University from 1944-1950. Mr. Christian, a native of Mechanicsville, Terrebonne Parish, Louisiana, was the son of Emanuel Banks Christian and Ruth Harris Christian. As a child, Mr. Christian attended school at the Houma Academy.

In addition to his work as a librarian, Mr. Christian was also a poet and author. In 1936, Christian joined the Federal Writers Project. This program was part of the Work Progress Administration (also known as WPA; later as the Works Project Administration) and was charged with providing jobs for authors, historians, and educators. Christian was assigned to the Louisiana Writers Project (LWP), the Louisiana section of the Federal Writers Project. He spent six years with the LWP, working on the history African Americans in Louisiana. His work on the project was done at Dillard University in New Orleans, Louisiana.

In 1943, Christian received a fellowship from the Rosenwald Fund* to study African American history. In 1944, he began his library career at Dillard University. Christian also published pieces in The Crisis, Phylon, Opportunity, New York Herald Tribune, Pittsburgh Courier, and in the Louisiana Weekly (he served as editor). He was a contemporary of Arna Wendell Bontemps and Langston Hughes.

Christian's works included:

From the Deep South (1937)
  
In Memoriam, Franklin Delano Roosevelt, Thirty-Second President of the United States of America, Who Died Thursday, April Twelfth, Nineteen Forty-Five (1945)

Common People's Manifesto of World War II (1948)

High Ground: A Collection of Poems Published in Commemoration of the United States Supreme Court's Decision of May 17, 1954, and Its Final Decree of May 31, 1955, Abolishing Racial Segregation in the Nation's Public Schools (1958)

Negro Soldiers in the Battle of New Orleans (1965)

Negro Ironworkers of Louisiana, 1718-1900 (1972)

I Am New Orleans and Other Poems (1999 -- published posthumously)


In his later years, Christian taught history at the University of New Orleans. Mr. Christian passed away on November 21, 1976. His papers are housed in the Louisiana and Special Collections Department of the Earl K. Long Library at the University of New Orleans.


*Note: The Rosenwald Fund was founded in 1917 by Julius Rosenwald (1862-1932), an executive of Sears, Roebuck, and Company.  The Rosenwald Fund provided money to build schools (known as the "Rosenwald Schools), and provided aid to colleges and universities, libraries, museums, and other institutions. In addition, the Rosenwald Fund paid for African Americans to attend the First Negro Library Conference in 1927 at the Hampton Institute (now Hampton University) and to receive training in 1930 at the Summer Librarian Institute at Spelman College.

See related posts: Dryades Branch of the New Orleans Public Library (New Orleans, Louisiana) : A Colored Carnegie Library ; Arna Wendell Bontemps: Fisk University Librarian, Poet, and Author ; and Arthur Alfonso Schomburg, 1874-1938: Noted Bibliophile, Collector, Curator, and Scholar.


Sources: Mizell-Nelson, Michael. "Marcus Bruce Christian." Harlem Renaissance Lives from the African American National Biography. Ed. Henry Louis Gates and Evelyn Brooks Higginbotham. New York: Oxford U P, 2009. 115-116. Print. ; Hessler, Marilyn S. "Marcus Christian: The Man and His Collection." Louisiana History 28.1 (1987): 37-55. Print. ; "Marcus Bruce Christian." Black Librarians Table. Chicken Bones: A Journal for Literary & Artistic African American Themes, n.d. Web. 16 Dec. 2010. ; Redding, Joan. "The Dillard Project: The Black Unit of the Louisiana Writers' Project." Louisiana History 32.1 (1991): 47-62. Print. ; Johnson, Jerah. "Marcus B. Christian and the WPA History of Black People in Louisiana." Louisiana History 20.1 (1979): 113-115. Print. ; Dalin, David G. (1998). "What Julius Rosenwald Knew." Commentary 105.4 (1998): 36-39. Print.; Fenton, Michele T. "Stepping Out on Faith: Lillian Haydon Childress Hall, Pioneer Black Librarian." Indiana Libraries 33.1 (2014): 6. Print. ; Curtis, Florence Rising. "Colored Librarians in Conference." Library Journal 52.8 (1927): 408. Print. ; "Personal." Library Occurrent 8.2 (1927): 66. Print. ; "Library Institute for Negro Librarians." Library Journal 55.18 (1930): 932. Print.