The Exhibit of American Negroes

Daniel A.P. Murray (1852-1925)
Preliminary List of Books and Pamphlets by Negro Authors, for the Paris Exposition and Library of Congress
Washington, D.C.: U.S. Commission to the Paris Exposition, 1900
Rare Book & Special Collections Division
Gift of Daniel A.P. Murray, 1926 (42A.7)

Paul Lawrence Dunbar (1872-1906)
Lyrics of a Lowly Life, New York: Dodd, Mead & Company, 1896
Rare Book & Special Collections Division
Gift of Daniel A.P. Murray, 1926 (42B.3)

On December 28, 1899, sociologist W.E.B. Du Bois began work on a display for the Exhibit of American Negroes at the 1900 Paris Exposition. DuBois focused on creating charts, maps, and graphs recording the growth of population, economic power, and literacy among African Americans in Georgia. He also included photographs of black businesses, churches, homes, and communities that defied the stereotypical images held by many white Americans. Daniel A.P. Murray, assistant to the Librarian of Congress, was asked to assemble written material, including a bibliography of 1400 titles, 200 books, and many of the 150 periodicals published by black Americans. Featured here are two authors represented in the bibliography, poet Paul Laurence Dunbar, who once worked at the Library, and William Wells Brown.

William Wells Brown (1815-1884)
Clotelle: A Tale of the Southern States
Boston: James Redpath, 1964.
Rare Book & Special Collections Division (42B.4)