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Charles W. Chesnutt to Carter Godwin Woodson, 3 January 1917

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  • Source Text: Charles W. Chesnutt to Carter Godwin Woodson, 3 January 1917, Horace Traubel and Anne Montgomerie Traubel Papers, Manuscript Division, Library of Congress, MSS43141.
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  CHAS. W. CHESNUTT 1105 WILLIAMSON BUILDING CLEVELAND O January 3, 1917 The Editor of The Journal of Negro History, 1216 You Street, N. W., Washington, D. C. Dear Sir:-

I am very glad to add my name to the list of subscribers to The Journal of Negro History.1 It is so customary to assume that the Negro has contributed nothing noteworthy to civilization, that a magazine, which in the interst of truth, will call attention to the other side of the ledger, will supply a distinct need and ought to be cordially and adequately supported.

Sincerely yours, Chas. W. Chesnutt. CWC:MOC


Correspondent: Carter G. Woodson (1875–1950) was a scholar, historian, author, and founder of The Journal of Negro History (now the Journal of African American History) and the Association for the Study of African and American Life and History. Largely self-taught as a youth, he studied at Berea College, earned an M.A. from the University of Chicago, and a Ph.D. from Harvard University. He built a collection of more than 5,000 items related to Black life and history, helped to launch "Negro History Week," and published majors works on migration, religion, and education, including The Miseducation of the Negro (1933).



1. The Journal of Negro History (now the Journal of African American History) was founded in 1916 by Carter G. Woodson, as one of the first journals to cover African American history. Though Chesnutt was consistently a subscriber to the journal, he did not contribute any publications.[back]

  • Cite (Chicago style): Charles W. Chesnutt, "Charles W. Chesnutt to Carter Godwin Woodson, 3 January 1917," The Charles W. Chesnutt Archive, Gen. Ed. Stephanie P. Browner, Matt Cohen, and Kenneth M. Price, accessed April 26, 2024. https://chesnuttarchive.org/item/ccda.corr00217.
  • Source File: ccda.corr00217.xml
  • Document ID: ccda.corr00217
  • Nature of source text: TLS
    • ALS: autograph letter signed
    • ADS: autograph draft signed
    • ADU: autograph draft unsigned
    • TLS: typed letter signed
    • TDS: typed draft signed
    • TDU: typed draft unsigned
    • TCS: typed copy signed
    • TCU: typed copy unsigned
    • ATR: autograph telegram received
    • TTR: typed telegram received
    • EXT: external source
  • Rights information: The base text of the original item is in the public domain. The text encoding and editorial notes were created and/or prepared by the Charles W. Chesnutt Archive and are licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License (CC BY-NC-SA 4.0). Any reuse of the material should credit the Charles W. Chesnutt Archive. [License]
  • Contributors to the digital file: Stewart, Ashlyn | Gilmore, Samantha | Matheis, Caitlin S. | Weakly, Laura K.
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