Born: 1878

Died: 1971

 

Area of Expertise: Lawyer and Collector of Black global experiences

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Inducted into Hall of Fame: 2018

Hall of Fame Presentation by Lopez Matthews, Jr (PDF)

Image courtesy of the Moorland-Spingarn Research Center

Dr. Thomas Battle in his 1988 article titled the "Moorland-Spingarn Research Center, Howard University" noted that Springarn "was a widely read scholar of Black history and literature who consulted with numerous editors, writers, scholars, diplomats, and booksellers throughout the world during his decades of collecting and assembled a collection of works by Negro authors that was unique in its depth, breadth, and quality. Spingarn had made this private collection available to scholars as a library of last resort". 

 

As a result of his global definition of Blackness he collected rare and unique books written by Afro-Cuban, Afro-Brazilian, and Haitian writers. 

Arthur B. Spingarn was born on March 28, 1878 in New York City; AB (1897), AM (1899), and LL.B (1900), Columbia University; LL.D, Howard University, 1941; L.H.D., Long Island University, 1966. He began practicing law in 1900 and became chairman of the national legal committee, then vice-president (1911-40), and president (1940-66) of the NAACP. He collected books about African Americans and was a member of bibliographic societies in London, Oxford, Cambridge, and Virginia. He founded the Spingarn Collection of Negro Literature at Howard University before his death on December 1, 1971. The archives were later renamed for him and Jesse Moorland as the Moorland-Spingarn Research Center.

 

Brief biography adapted from Finding Aid for the Ephemera from the Arthur B. Spingarn Collection of Negro Literature, 1912-1964 at UCLA