THE DPWRC BOOK COLLECTION

INTRODUCTION

Blockson credits "foremother" Dorothy Porter Wesley, the late curator and librarian of Howard University's Moorland-Spingarn Collection, as an early influence and mentor. Porter Wesley, who died December 17, 1995 at age 91, assisted such distinguished scholars as W.E.B. DuBois and John Hope Franklin. In 1930, as a young librarian, she was asked by Howard to assemble a collection of books by black Americans. At the time, the library contained about 3000 volumes. Under her stewardship, the collection grew to more than 180,000 catalogued items and became a focal point for research on black history. David Levering Lewis's biographies of DuBois and Martin Luther King Jr., benefited from Porter's legwork, as did Louis Harlan's work on Booker T. Washington, and William McFeely's on Frederick Douglass.

A "go-getter of raw material," is how John Henrik Clarke, the late Hunter College professor emeritus, described Porter in her prime. She was known to frequent estate sales, acquiring trunks of old records, books, and personal correspondence. Clarke said Porter collected "things other people hadn t even thought about." For instance, he recalled that once while in Africa she bought scores of a True Stories-like series, little pamphlets printed on the worst paper you could find and sold on the streets for just pennies." Today, because of Porter's eye for the obscure and the novel, the Moorland-Spingarn collection has one of the largest caches of popular African mysteries in the world. (Black bibliophiles ... by angela ardes)

THE ART (ART, ART BOOKS AND ART-RELATED MATERIALS WILL BE KEPT TOGETHER AS A SEPARATE COLLECTION) AND POETRY COLLECTIONS WILL BE LISTED SEPARATELY AT A LATER DATE. THE AFRO-LATIN, BRAZILIAN AND AFRICAN TITLES HAVE ALSO NOT YET BEEN LISTED. THERE ARE MANY 1st EDITION AND INSCRIBED GENERAL TITLES WHICH HAVE NOT YET BEEN LISTED. THERE ARE STILL THREE HUNDRED OR SO UNPACKED BOXES CONTAINING CORRESPONDENCE, PRINTED MATERIALS, PHOTOGRAPHS AND PRINTS AND VERTICAL FILE INFORMATION WHICH HAVE NOT YET BEEN LISTED. THERE ARE AT LEAST A DOZEN SCRAPBOOKS AND OTHER ARTIFACTS. THERE ARE ALSO SEVERAL LARGE BOXES FULL OF CLOTHS AND TEXTILES FROM AFRICA AND BRAZIL.

Collection appraisal provided by Wyatt Houston Day, Book Seller, Appraisers Association of America, Nyack, New York
Other values obtained from recent book catalogues of dealers such as McBlain and Between The Covers

Notes: os= owner's signature; insc= inscription; dj= dust jacket; fe=first edition fine= optimum quality; sl= slight; dj-dust jacket; bk rev = book review; bkpl= bookplate; gd= good (meaning acceptable, but flawed) c= copy; na= not appraised; pb= paperback; 2d= second edition; vg= very good; (Charles Blockson subject headings)

cast of characters (as best i know at the moment)!!! mcblain - items in his latest catalog and his notes on the item; wsn = william stuart nelson, former vice-president, howard university under mordecai johnson; lula allen - librarian, minor teacher's college, washington, dc - influenced dpw to become librarian rather than teacher; bertha allan - sister of lula allan - allan's were sisters of martha allan macdoo, wife of macdoo of jubilee singers fame - have two scrapbooks of announcements, programs, and newspaper reviews of their concerts, and five fans, and numerous photos, and documents; henry proctor slaughter - dpw arranged for his african american literary collection to be placed at altanta university and he was my godfather; blanche nelson - wife of wsn; beatrice s. catlett (catlett family of washington, dc - more research needs to be done); monroe alpheus majors - 1st african american to receive m.d. license in ca.; civil rights leader; spr = sarah parker remond; john francis porter - one of james amos porter's older brothers; alice burnett taylor - dpw's sister; leonie burnett harper - dpw's sister; bertha e. sadler - dpw's mother; frank nichols - artist, related to cardoza family of dc; dan hill - jap's first or second cousin; sue e. houchins - friend of dpw; e.c. williams - librarian at howard when dpw first started and one of her mentors; george w. crawford is a mystery - two year ago i bought one of wesley's books at auction and crawford's sig. was inside!; ethel page - dpw's best friend and secretary of librarian (reason), hu; stanton wormley - wormley family of dc, contacted w. hu, father was james l. wormley, master wood craftsman who designed furniture and crafted 20-21 extremely detailed dollhouses with lights fireplaces with lights behind, changing sceneries in the dining area, scaled furniture average size was 48" side x 36" high x 24" deep - i donated mine to the smithsonian's center for african american history and culture in 1996; Esther Popel Shaw - poet; Ruby Essien, former HU employee and a professional proofreader; Inex Boulton - old dc friend of dpw; rosey e. poor - old friend, poet, writer, artist; edward & marion hope - old friends, dc; ethel page - secretary to joseph reason, library director, howard university; characters: lorraine a. williams, head hu dept of history; bertha b. sadler - dpw's mother; amada v. gray hilyer (wife of andrew f. hilyer - hu)

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CATEGORIES

BOOKS W. INSCRIPTIONS OR PUBLISHED PRIOR TO 1900
BOOKS PUBLISHED BETWEEN 1900 & 1945
BOOKS PUBLISHED AFTER 1945
REFERENCE & BIBLIOGRAPHY
POETRY
ART
MUSIC, CHILDREN'S
GENERAL & MISCELLANEOUS
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FOR INFORMATION ON PURCHASING THE COLLECTION WRITE, PHONE OR FAX: CONI PORTER UZELAC, Executive Director
DOROTHY PORTER WESLEY RESEARCH CENTER, Inc
2400 E. LAS OLAS BLVD. Ste. 123
FORT LAUDERDALE, FLORIDA 33301-1529 USA
Phone:(954) 463-7880 Fax:(954)463-7881
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