Blackwell Reference Online

Extract

African American race relations authority and academic administrator Charles Spurgeon Johnson was born in Bristol, Virginia on July 24, 1893. The grandson of a slave and the son of a Baptist minister, Johnson was inspired by religious ideals and a commitment to end social inequality. He graduated from Wayland Academy and studied at Virginia Union University, both in Richmond, Virginia. He completed a BA in sociology from the University of Chicago in 1917. After America entered World War I, he enlisted in the army. He returned to the university in 1919 and begin his graduate studies with Robert Ezra Park. In the summer of 1919 a major race riot occurred in Chicago, and the Chicago Commission on Race Relations, under the auspices of the Chicago Urban League, began to investigate the conditions leading up to it. Johnson directed this research from 1919 to 1921. In 1922 the commission published The Negro in Chicago , wherein Johnson made significant contributions. In 1921 he moved to New York to direct research for the National Urban League. From 1923 to 1928 he edited their magazine, Opportunity , an important publishing outlet during the Harlem Renaissance. It influenced the careers of many artists including Langston Hughes, Zora Neale Hurston, and Arnaud Bontemps. In 1929 Johnson moved to Nashville, Tennessee, where he chaired the social sciences department at Fisk University. ... log in or subscribe to read full text