Making History: Meta Warrick Fuller's "Ethiopia"
Renée Ater
American Art, Vol. 17, No. 3. (Autumn, 2003), pp. 12-31.
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http://www.jstor.org Tue May 29 14:36:10 2007 Making History Meta Warrick Fuller's Ethiopia
Rente Ater Meta Warrick Fuller (1877-1968) creat- hand breaks away at an angle from her ed Ethiopia for the America's Making bound legs. The figure's head, draped Exposition, a 1921 fair that focused on in a nemes worn by Egyptian kings, is the contributions of immigrants to turned to her left and her eyes gaze over American society. Sponsored by the her left shoulder. Fuller's original small- New York City and New York State scale model, now lost and known only Departments of Education, the festival through surviving photographs, was the and accompanying pageants were held at first of several versions she created during the Seventy-first Regiment Armory at her lifetime of the sculpture, variously Thirty-fourth Street and Park Avenue called Ethiopia, Awakening Ethiopia, from October 29 to November 12. At Ethiopia Awakening, or The Awakening of the suggestion of writer W. E. B. Du Ethiopia. A later, sixty-seven-inch plaster Bois, James Weldon Johnson, field figure, similar in design, is pictured here secretary of the National Association (frontispiece).2 for the Advancement of Colored People Art historians such as David Driskell, (NAACP) and chairman of the exposi- Judith Wilson, and Richard Powell have tion's "Colored Section," requested that rightly discussed this sculpture in terms Fuller sculpt the allegorical figure for of its Pan-African ideals and the way in this event. "They had an idea all cut and which the work symbolized a new radi- dried that they would have Ethiopia," calized black identity at the beginning of Fuller recalled in discussing the commis- the Harlem Renaissance, a flowering of sion. She agreed to make "a twelve-inch literature, music, and visual art in the sketch or model which could be enlarged early twentieth century. A more in-depth to whatever size they wanted."' and nuanced discussion of the historical The artist ultimately conceived a context for this important work can fur- striking image of a pseudo-Egyptian ther enrich our understanding, however.3 black woman unwrapping her swathed Fuller's sculpture must be looked at lower body, a mummified form slowly Meta Warrick Fuller, Ethiopia within the framework of the America's (detail), rnid-192Os. painted plas- returning to life. Her right hand rests in Making Exposition and contemporary ter, 67 in. high. ~rtand Artifacts the center of her chest where her crossed perceptions of Egypt and Ethiopia, which Division, Schomburg Center for arms were positioned in death, and supplied source material and context for Research in Black Culture, New York Public Library, Astor, Lenox between thumb and forefinger she holds her conceptualization. Fuller turned to and Tilden ~oundations the end of her linen shroud. Her left Egypt for archaeological references and
13 American Art .%' ..-*-,:&.i ,3- t:;;. , .,&1-:
'A "'J.d. an authentic racial identity by looking to the grand achievements of Egyptian his- tory while also supporting the romantic ideal of Christian Ethiopia as a symbol of black liberation. At the same time, it was assimilationist in the way it was exhibited at a "melting pot" event, repre- senting the emancipation of a people attempting to prove their value to a society that had long excluded blacks from full involvement as United States citizens.
The Journey to Ethiopia
Born in Philadelphia in 1877 to a mid- dle-class family, Meta Warrick (fig. 1) received her early artistic training at the Pennsylvania Museum and School of Industrial Arts beginning in 1897. She followed a course of study at the school that focused on applied arts, including decorative painting and design, and grad- uated in 1899. With the encouragement of a teacher, she decided to further her art instruction overseas and studied in Paris until 1902. Much influenced by the French sculptor Auguste Rodin, whose I studio she visited at Meudon, the young American modeled The Wretched (fig. 2) I!! I!! after the tympanum of his Gates of Hell I .; :-- r . (1880-1917). She exhibited the small figural group to much acclaim at the Parisian art gallery L'Art Nouveau Bing . and at the 1903 Salon of the Socittt Nationale des Beaux-Arts. After her return to the United States, she initially 1 Photograph of Meta Warrick historical validation of African Americans' settled in Philadelphia and then in the Fuller, ca. 1911. Meta Warrick place in history. The artist used Ethiopia Boston area following her marriage in Fuller Photograph Collection, Schornburg Center for Research in the title of her work to represent a 1909 to psychiatrist Solomon Carter in Black Culture, New York source of racial pride as well as to refer- Fuller Jr. African American organizers, Public Library, Astor, Lenox and ence the literary-religious tradition of especially Du Bois, provided Fuller with Tilden Foundations Ethiopianism that was based on the bibli- three major commissions related to fairs cal prophecy of Psalm 68:31: "Princes and expositions: in 1907 she created shall come out of Egypt; Ethiopia shall fourteen tableaux for the Jarnestown soon stretch out her hands unto God." Tercentennial Exposition in Virginia; in Ethiopia ultimately served two seem- 1913 she made a seven-foot sculpture ingly contradictory purposes. It filled a titled Emancipation (fig. 3) for the need for African Americans to formulate semi-centennial celebration of the Emancipation Proclamation in Boston; Ethiopia, with a crystal globe in each and in 1920-21 she produced Ethiopia." hand, that would occupy a central place By the early 1920s Fuller had become in the black exhibits: one of the preeminent black artists of her time. As her principal advocate and a Her darkface shinesforth from the massed close family friend, Du Bois sought drapery of a white Sudanese bernouse out Fuller for the America's Making whichflows down infolds to the ground Exposition commission. Du Bois was a and has perhaps a single splash of crimson prominent political philosopher and cul- color. rhefacP has closed &es and on the tural critic, and editor of the Crisis, the cheek a slight trace of tears. The arms and magazine of the NAACP Most likely, hands are black and bare and in the right the pageant he had produced for the hand is a crystal globe marked Music and National Emancipation Exposition in in the lef)a crystalglobe marked Labor." October 1913 was one of Fuller's early inspirations for this project. She had seen Ultimately, however, Fuller relied on her his "The People of Peoples and Their own artistic imagination to complete the Gifts to Men," later renamed "The Star sculpture for the exposition. As prepara- of Ethiopia" (fig. 4), at the Twelfth tions advanced for the fair, the Crisis Regiment Armory in New York, where reported that she was "designing a statue it was part of the celebration of which will be in the center the fiftieth anniversary of the of the Negro exhibit, show- Emancipation Proclamation.5 ing a female figure emerging As one of the executive from the wrappings of committee members of the a mummy with hands "Colored Section" of the upraised, symbolizing Americals Making the self-emancipation of Exposition, Du Bois that race from ignorance proposed an elaborate into educated, self-reliant citizens
2 Mera Warrick Fuller, The Wretc/~ed,ca. 1 90 1. Bronze, 17 x 21 x 15 in. Maryhill Museum of Art, Goldendale, Washingron
15 Arnerirnn Art 3 Meta Warrick Fuller, Emancipation, 191 3; bronze cast, 1999. 84 in. high. National Center of Afro-American Artists and the Museum of Afro American History, Boston A scene from "The Star of Ethiopia" pageant. Photograph reproduced in the Crisis 7, no. 1 (December 1913), p. 79
and makers of America." We do not during the early decades of the 1900s. know whether the Crisis report about the While a student in Paris, Fuller visited position of the figure's arms was inaccu- the Louvre on many occasions and most rate or whether Fuller revised them as she likely saw its collection of Egyptian arti- worked. But she did elaborate on her facts, which had been on view since intentions in a letter to an acquaintance 1826. As a resident of Framingham, shortly before the 1921 fair opened, saying: Massachusetts, a small town outside of Boston, she also had at her disposal one Here was a group (Negro) who had once of the most significant collections of made history and now afier a long sleep was Egyptian art in the United States at awaking, gradually unwinding the bandage Boston's Museum of Fine Arts. Among of its mummiedpast and looking out on life the important objects in the collection again, expectant but unafiaid and with at at the time was the statue of King least a graceJilgesture. Why you may ask Menkaure and his queen (fig. 6). The the Egyptian mot$ The answer, the most artist stated in her 1921 letter that she brilliant period, perhaps of Egyptian history was alluding to a period in Egyptian his- was the period of the Negro kings.7 tory when "the Negro kingsn ruled, a ref- erence assuredly to the reign of Kushite kings in Egypt from 712 to 664 BCE. Looking to Egypt for Vindication An avid reader of the Crisis, Fuller learned of Egyptian art, in part, from In her rendering and titling of the sculp- the magazine's exclusive coverage of ture, the artist conflated an interest in archaeological excavations in the Sudan historical EgyPt with a mythical represen- and Ethiopia, which stressed the reign tation of Ethiopia. Although clearly an of the Kushite kings and the ancient city allegorical image, Fuller's Ethiopia (fig. 5 of Meroe.8 and frontispiece) should be understood Ethiopia seemingly mimics the self- in the context of the archaeological contained aesthetic of Egyptian funerary recovery of Egyptian funerary sculpture statuary. Similar in form to mummies
17 American Art Meta Warrick Fuller, Ethiopia, mid-1920s. Painted plaster, 67 in. high. Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, New York Public Library
King Menkaure (Mycerinw) and Queen, Egyptian, Old Kingdom, Dynasty 4, reign of Menkaure, ca. 2590-2472 BCE. Greywacke sandstone, 56 x 22 ?hx 21 ?4 in. Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, Harvard University-Museum of Fine Arts Expedition
Daniel Chester French, AJizca, from The Four Continents, 1903-1907. Plaster model, dimensions unknown, for marble group at U.S. Custom House, New York. Peter A. Juley & Son Collection, Smithsonian American Art Museum, Washington, D.C.
Anne Whitnep Ethiopia (Africa), 1863-64, destroyed. Plaster, dimensions unknown. From Freeman Murray, Emancipation and the Freed in American Sculpture (Washington, D.C., 1916)
body, which moves more freely, the head turned to the left and the right hand in the center of her chest. Here Fuller has departed from the squared frontality of Egyptian sculpture and shown us, with her shift in style to Beaux-Arts natural- ism, the metamorphosis from dormancy to awakening. Fuller treated Ethiopia? facial features with a distinctive reference to black physiognomy. The artist created a visage with full lips, a wide nose with flared and figurines termed shawabtis or shabtis, nostrils, and sharply angled cheekbones. her lower body is completely encased, The most unusual element of Fuller's fig- broken only by the left hand jutting ure is that she wears the Egyptian king- away from the legs. The crisscross pattern ship headdress called a nemes. Within covering the figure's shrouded legs evokes Egyptian tradition, artisans rarely sculpted Egyptian embalming techniques and women with a nemes, except in the case entombment practices in which the of Queen Hatshepsut who was often rep- body is tightly wrapped in linen. resented as a male in the regalia of the However, the mummified lower body pharaoh. It is tempting to think that Fuller contrasts significantly with the upper might have been likening her figure renderings of Cleopatra and the western tradition of depicting Cleopatra, prefer- ring to create an allegorical female form that articulates an imagined concept of Egypt rather than a literal archaeological reference to Egyptian statuary or to a specific person.9 Fuller's use of Egyptian art and themes was not unusual for an American artist. Painter Elihu Vedder, for example, had evoked mystical Egypt in two ver- sions of The Questioner of the Sphinx (1863); both Edmonia Lewis and William Wetmore Story carved marble Cleopatras in the 1860s; and Martin Milmore created a monumental American Sphinx (1872) for the Mount Auburn Cemetery in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Fuller was specifically aware of two other artists working with the trope of EgyptIEthiopia. She had corresponded with the historian Freeman Murray and served as a reader for his 1916 volume, Emancipation and the Freed in American Sculpture: A Study in Interpretation. Through an exchange of letters, they discussed sculptor Daniel Chester French's figure of Africa for The Four Continents (fig. 7), which was executed for the U.S. Custom House in New York City and highlighted in Murray's book. French's large-scale figure of Africa was flanked by a sphinx and a lion. Murray saw the figure as an Ethiopian type; Fuller read the figure as symbolic of Africa, remarking that French "probably strove to suggest all the African types, Egyptian etc." In her review of the manuscript, Fuller also certainly saw and read about Anne Whitney's now-destroyed Ethiopia (fig. 8), which Murray reproduced. Murray quoted from an 1883 publication titled to that of the ancient queen, but we Our Famous Women for a description of should consider Fuller's use of the nemes Whitney's monumental sculpture: on a woman together with the encased lower body as a synthesis of elements of [S'he saw in the near fiture the deliver- Egyptian and western art that best suited ance of a racefiom imbruting bondage, her early-twentieth-century sensibilities. and, later, the illumination of the dark She also seems to have ignored Egyptian continent fiom which it sprang. This grand
19 American Art and mighty conception she sought to embody Europeans' interest in the connections inform. . . . The symbolization is that of between the classical cultures of Greece a colossal Ethiopian woman, in a half and Rome and ancient Egypt. By the recumbent position. . . . She has been sleep- mid-nineteenth century, Americans ing for ages in the glowing sands of the had incorporated the Egyptian style desert, out of which she is l@ing herself: . . . into funerary architecture; later, they Half rising, with sleep yet heavy on her eye- adapted designs to the fine and decora- lids, she supports herselfon the left hand tive arts including sculpture, painting, and arm, while she listens with fear and furniture, wallpaper, and sundry other wonder to the sound of broken chains and household items. With the discovery shackles filling around hex 1 0 of King Tutankhamun's tomb in late 1922, the American public expressed Remarkably, Murray wrote that he a renewed interest in all things thought Whitney's work should be titled Egyptian.12 "Ethiopia Awakening for its "representa- In contrast to the popular craze for tive expression of the faith, hope, and Egyptian forms, Egyptology stressed the 'high resolve' of the noblest hearts the serious study of culture, history, and and minds of the time." Equally impor- artifacts. During the nineteenth century, tant for this discussion, Whitney had historians were engaged in a contentious inscribed on the base of her sculpture debate about the ethnicity of Egyptians. a verse taken from Psalm 68:3 1: "And In a time when racial classification was Ethiopia Shall Lift Up her Hands Unto considered a legitimate scientific tool, God-a slight rephrasing of the King determining Egyptians' race was of James passage. African American thinkers utmost importance, for Egypt was con- often cited this biblical scripture in both sidered a cradle of civilization. Several political and literary works to evoke a modern-day scholars have noted that prophecy of the universal freedom of Americans often used Egyptology to blacks from bondage. From as early as justify slavery and polygenesis, the January 1915 Fuller expressed her desire notion that the races had different to create a similar figure. She wrote origins. For the polygenists, the concept Murray then of her interest in the theme of a single family tree of the races was "The Rise of Ethiopia," which abhorrent, particularly the idea that she hoped "someday to attempt." In the Caucasian and African races shared April 191 5 she reported to him that she the same lineage. In their promulgation was considering the same theme for a of racial hierarchy, advocates of poly- sculpture to be submitted to the Lincoln genesis saw Caucasians as the primary Jubilee and Exposition in Chicago. Ulti- race while all others were degenerate mately, she did not have time, however, forms.13 to complete such a work until Johnson The field of Egyptology had created commissioned the piece for the America's doubt about the nature of this racial Making Exposition. Fuller's early interest hierarchy. French scholar Constantin- in the topic of Ethiopia may have caused Fran~oisChasseboeuf, Comte de Volney writer Alain Locke to misdate the sculp- (1747-1825), for example, asserted that ture in his influential 1940 book The Egyptians were of the black race, stating Negro in Art, an error that was carried that ancient Egypt was founded by "a over in much subsequent scholarship.ll race of men now rejected from society The western fascination with Egypt- for their sable skin and frizzled hair." His Egyptomania-extends from Roman findings and those of Dominique Vivant times to our new millennium. Napoleon's Denon (1747-1825), the scientific campaign into Egypt in 1798 heightened leader of the Napoleonic expedition to Egypt in 1798, were later disputed by The Legacy of Ethiopia white scholars from Britain and the United States. Americans, such as Samuel Ethiopia was a lace that held longstand- George Morton in his 1839 Crania ing interest for African Americans. In the Americana and 1844 Crania Aegyptiaca, nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, used phrenology and Egyptology to the term "Ethiopia" was employed in a prove that Egyptians were indeed of number of ways: to describe the whole the white race. Morton argued that he continent of Africa, but also to indicate could determine race from the features the actual modern state of Ethiopia of skulls and concluded that the majority (Abyssinia) or to refer to ancient of Egyptians were not African. Under- Ethiopia (Kush). African Americans lying his purported scientific method championed modern Ethiopia for was the belief that such a great civiliza- several reasons. Emperor Menelik I1 of tion could only have been created by the Abyssinia, who was descended from a Caucasian race.'* three thousand-year-old monarchy that Fuller's decision to reference Egypt in had embraced Christianity in the fourth form and to racialize Ethiopia? features century, defeated the Italians in 1896, must be understood in light of early becoming the first African leader to African American scholars' claims of remove a colonial power. The black press racial linkage to Egypt. Within the African celebrated his victory and in December American community, late-nineteenth- 1913 mourned his death. For the black century scholars emphatically declared community in the United States, Ethiopia the blackness of the Egyptians, refuting symbolically represented a source of racial hierarchies and offering- an alterna- black power and pride and functioned tive paradigm to the white historical dis- as a symbolic homeland.16 course that placed Egypt in relation to African Americans also linked Greco-Roman civilization. Dispelling the Ethiopianism to a Christian prophetic hypothesis that blacks had no culture vision of Africa in two ways. They associ- and were biblically destined to be slaves, ated it with the rise of black independent the African American historians' claim of churches in South Africa from the 1870s a black Egypt provided an ancient and to the 1890s. For them, Ethiopianism noble lineage that disputed white histori- was a literary-religious tradition as well, cal hegemony. The historian August derived from the Christian biblical scrip- Meier has noted that African Americans' ture of Psalm 68:3 1. This passage was interest in establishing a black history, cited as early as 1808 in a sermon deliv- particularly one with ancient traditions, ered by Peter Williams Jr. at Saint Phillip's was rooted in "the need to assert and African Church in New York City. The prove their equality with whites as a poet Francis Ellen Watkins Harper bor- means of convincing whites of their wor- rowed the phrasing in her circa 1855 thiness . . . and the need to give them- poem "Ethiopia": selves a sense of dignity and pride of race."ls Fuller acknowledged- this need Ye, Ethiopia yet shall stretch for historical validation and vindication, Her bleeding hands to God and rendered a regal physiognomy that Her cry of agony shall reach celebrated blackness. African American The burning throne of God' viewers of the time would have under- stood her reference to ancient history Both Williams and Harper used the verse and her sculpture's significance as an in relation to the abolition of slavery. In object that exemplified the continuation the nineteenth and early twentieth centu- of black cultural "genius." ry, African and African American clergy
2 1 American Art and lay leaders understood the Psalm as a biblical prediction that Africa and its peoples would be delivered from bondage. GAe 73ooh of They used the "Ethiopian prophecy" in ERICA'S MAKING sermons, anti-slavery writings, public EXPOSZTICIN speeches, and even in the design of 1ST. REGIMENT ARN NEW YORK mastheads of newspapers such as the OCTOBER 29-NwEMBn Bhck Republican in New Orleans and the Freeman in Indianapolis.17 Fuller's Ethiopia clearly references Psalm 68:3 1, with her rendering of the figure's hand breaking free from the bindings. The interest in Ethiopia could be seen as well in black revisionist history texts from the nineteenth and early twentieth
century. In his Histo y of the Negro Race UbIDERthr AU in America (1886), black historian George STA TE DEPARTB JCATION Washington Williams presented the most significant early account of ancient Africa. Not only did Williams trumpet the im- portance of Egypt as a great black civiliza- tion, he also traced Egypt's origins to vided a source of communal pride; and Ethiopia, using the translated work of the they created "a reservoir of ideas to spur ancient Greek historian Herodotus. Other new conceptualizations of race conscious- black thinkers, including Edward Blyden, ness."l9 Ethiopia embodied these new Joseph Casely Hayford, and Du Bois, conceptualizations with its references incorporated the ideas of Ethiopianism to ancient Egypt and to Ethiopianism; into their writings. For example, Casely Fuller's awakening black woman indi- Hayford's Ethiopia Unbound (191 I), a cated a nation reclaiming its rightful combination of novel and political com- place in history and asserting racial mentary, focused on Ethiopia as a symbol pride. of black independence.18 Du Bois's widely read 1915 survey of African history titled The Negro relied on The America's Making Exposition both the Williams and Casely Hayford texts as source material. In The Negro, While Egypt and Ethiopia were primary Du Bois reclaimed Egypt for the conti- sources of artistic and intellectual inspira- nent of Africa. Using archaeological tion for Fuller's sculpture, the America's evidence, he emphasized that Egyptian Making Exposition of 1921 provided the monuments showed distinctly "Negro original context for its display. With and mulatto faces." Most importantly, he funding from the Carnegie Foundation traced Egypt's origins to Ethiopia. Thus, and John D. Rockefeller, the exposition's for Du Bois and black historians, the ear- organizing committee invited thirty-three liest known civilization was based in "racial groups" to participate in the fif- Ethiopia, a black nation. In his book To teen-day civic affair (figs. 9 and 10). It Wake the Nations, Eric Sundquist argues defined immigrants as "all groups of new that the black revisionist writings of comers who have settled in America from Du Bois and others conveyed three 1607 to date, during the period in which important ideas to their readers: they their racial distinctiveness is retained." countered racist historiography; they pro- These loosely defined "immigrants" As outlined by its officers and execu- tive committee, the festival sought to RTHEHE AMF,KICA-hllZK1NG demonstrate "the most important histori- IS A REGULAR BUSINESS cal, economic, and cultural contributions that Americans of various descent" had made to the nation. An article in the New krk Times described the function of the public spectacle in larger, more progressive terms, saying: "[It is] a move- ment to abolish the racial prejudice growing out of the war, to bring about a better understanding by all Americans of the part played in the development of the country by every one of the races of immigrants who sought our shores, to instill an adequate understanding of the greatness of America, and to demonstrate that the country may weather any and all storrns."21 New York City Mayor John Hylan and New York Governor Nathan Miller praised the America's Making Exposition 9 Cover of The Book ofAmerica? ranged from groups who had arrived as for its symbolic representation of assimi- Making Ejcposition (New York: colonists, indentured servants, and slaves lation. While citing the diversity of City and State Departments of participants during opening-evening Education, 1921) in the seventeenth century to the wave of Eastern Europeans entering the United remarks, Miller stated, "We have been 10 Illustrations of posters from States in the late nineteenth and early called a melting pot, and it is very signif- The Book ofAmerica? Making twentieth centuries. The authors of the icant that there are thirty-three different Ejcposition foreword to the official book of the races who are uniting in this effort to exposition declared the nation to be "a teach America what each separately and land of one people" to which each immi- altogether collectively have done to con- grant population had brought unique tribute to the making of America." The gifts and "laid them on the Altar of narrative of harmony among people of America." They further stated that different origins, appearances, and expe- "hatred of old-time neighbors, national riences did not prevent controversy: vari- prejudices and ambitions, traditional ous groups debated issues such as who fears, set standards of living, gaceless had discovered America and who had intolerance, class rights and the demand made the most valuable contributions. of class-these were barred at the gates." African American participants, however, In her study of the exposition, theater apparently did not engage in these con- historian Ilana Abrarnovitch has aptly flicts about past roles.22 remarked that "America's Making com- Although African Americans had been bined the pageantry of American nation- forcibly brought to the United States as alism with an exhibition of cultural dif- slaves, the planning committee invited ference in the name of Americanization." them to the fair as "honorary immi- The organizers highlighted cultural plu- grants." Organizers of the "Colored ralism as the ostensible purpose of the Section" exhibit-a collaborative effort festival, but a belief in assimilation and by the NAACP and the National Urban a unified American cultural identity League-did not acknowledge this "hon- underscored their rhetoric.20 orary" status, choosing to sublimate the
23 American Art Often excluded from pageants in local - - communities, blacks frequently found themselves stereotyped in historical spec- tacles and exhibits based on images from popular theater that glorified the South and minstrel shows that portrayed blacks as comic buffoons. Since Reconstruction, their status in the United States had deteriorated significantly. By the turn of the nineteenth century, lynching was on an upswing, large numbers of African Americans lived in poverty in both the rural South and urban North, and pro- gressive politics seemed to have had little impact on segregation and racism. The 1915 release of D. W. Griffith's film The Birth of a Nation embodied the nativist impulses of the period: the movie angered members of the African American com- munity with its ignominious stereotypes and engendered a national protest cam- paign.24 With artworks like Ethiopia and participation in events like the America's Making Exposition, the African American intelligentsia had a chance to produce new represeatations of blacks, even as "honorary immigrants." Through displays that focused on the industrial contributions and educational work of African Americans, Johnson, Du Bois, and others aspired to enlighten the larger white population, to uplift the race, and to locate themselves as integral to 11 Negro Social and Industrial legacy of slavery in favor of creating a American history and life (see fig. 1 1 for Exhibit, Palace of Social Economy, positive modern self-image and under- Du Bois's early exhibit of similar material 1900. From Report of the scoring black contributions to American for the 1900 Paris Universal Exposition). Commissioner-general fir the International Universal Eyosition, society. All participating immigrant As contributing editor of the New York Paris, I900 (Washington, D.C.: groups were able to shape their own rep- Age, Johnson promoted the America's Government Printing Ofice, 1901) resentation at the festival. Each group Making Exposition in his weekly column, 12 "Americans of Negro Lineage," developed and financed its own displays, writing, "This affair offers the colored from The Book ofArnen'cai Making and a memorandum of understanding people of New York City and State great Eyosition between the organizers and immigrant opportunity. . . . 'America's Making' gives 13 Photograph of "The National groups stated: "It is understood that each us the opportunity to bring to the eyes of Emancipation Exposition: The racial group will be entirely free to deter- hundreds and thousands of people and of Temple of Beauty in the Great mine for itself the extent and manner of the entire press of this great city the worth Court of Freedom." From the its participation in America's Making." while things that race has done and given Crisis 7, no. 1 (December 1913), p. 78 This was especially important for African to help make America the great nation
Americans whose image- had been under that it is."25 attack for centuries in every facet of The "Colored Section" installation American life.23 included charts, drawings, and examples of literature and art (fig. 12). In addition :4JZEI The exhibit consists of a booth. At the back of the booth rises a pyramid in bas-relief with a side view of the great sphinx of "Ethiopia" ..I Syinbolic Statrrr oi tlrp Giza at either side of the pyramid. The E.l/..I.VCIP,,/TIO.V oi tli~.YEGRO pyramid is divided horizontally into seven K:ICE. unequal spaces. In a narrow space at the F~onrtlrr Exhibit bottom is Exploration. Above this is a very large space, Labor. Above this is a small space, Self Supporting Womanhood; then a hrge space, Emancipation of Democracy; above this an equal space, Defense; above this a smaller space, Literature; and a large cap stone, Music. (S thr lrlalrinc cli .\mcrirn. thr plrt pl.ttc,l Irr :hr African group is nf trmrmdour irnportanrr. Ili. :rear mntri- Both sides of this booth will be occupied twt~or~<11:tvt -1 lalv,r, pcrwnxl vrvi.. nmt mt~ic. by books, pictures, and charts.26 Srcrr, I;tlx,r in \In\rn 11111 ir~cdom.CIPZTCII tl)~for~sts nud ca.am(r h3r tltc crrnr x~iirulttnrnlrrcions ni tl~cht!tl~. It #~~tcrcd:\~n~rica nrtr yr:tr lwisgr? 11w l'uri12n- rind onh 1 ~ !*.nr\~ after~ taw Cxvalicrs.1 ~ ~l:rnm tht. rarlj l itl~(:rnrun. ro rhr prrrrnt dm. Kc.::rn I.elr*lr hxi lvrn ~ncli~pm~ahlcin tllc itnnrlammt:il indt15rrin ni t'lr ic8t,:t,. ),I it. uork ,I~pmd(I),- crmt , ropq ~$1cotton, .~:.tr. t~t,a',.~ancl row. S.-K~,~SZI.,~ ,.nt:ac~d in tlw op~ra. No images survive of the booth, but tinn of rrlal n>~w.. t>.hrrm anmirranslx~rr:ctic~n. Ir In* iurn:.l>cll i>iihiul pcrronal nn~l'lnmr.rir urrirr 2nd m~rnrlvI~tc it is possible to imagine the sense of ~~~ccw~l~~!4" t'~.ckillvd trz,l York Axe,- an African American newspaper,- - noted that "the consensus of opinion was that it [Ethiopia]was the best expressed ideal in the whole armory." At the end of the festival, African Americans expressed satisfaction with their participation. Eugene Kinckle Jones, executive secretary of the National Urban League, wrote to the exposition's president to voice his enthusiasm: "May I take this opportunity to tell you how pleased the colored group was with the whole pro- ceedings of 'America's Making.' We felt that this was the first time the Negroes have been given a real chance to demon- strate their ability to work out such mat- ters in co-operation with the community as a whole."27 25 American Art History, Nationalism, and Pageants eant, she unveiled herself and took her place in a chariot, leading the race to a One of the important elements of the new day. Du Bois saw the pageant form, America's Making Exposition was that at its zenith in the early twentieth centu- each of the thirty-three groups created ry, as an opportunity "to teach on the and participated in its own performance. one hand the colored people themselves Du Bois had used the tropes of Ethiopia the meaning of their history and their and Ethiopianism to represent the rich, emotional life through a new the- essence of a re-emerging nation in his ater, and on the other, to reveal the 1913 pageant "The Star of Ethiopia," Negro to the white world as a human, which he modified and produced for the feeling thing."29 America's Making Exposition as "The Du Bois's pageant for the 1921 expo- Seven Gifts of Ethiopia to America." sition, "The Seven Gifts of Ethiopia to "The Star of Ethiopia" had premiered in America," illustrated African Americans' New York City as part of the National contributions to the making of America. Emancipation Exposition. A scene from The pageant depicted seven scenes set to this pageant (see fig. 4) depicts a pseudo- music, beginning with the African drum Egyptian temple in the background and in the New World and continuing to the dancing "forty maidens" before "the contemporary Broadway songs. Slowly Enthroned Pharaoh Ra, the Negro." throughout the performance, participants Produced in six acts with a prelude, each constructed a pyramid. The first scene episode of "The Star of Ethiopia" illus- portrayed Estevancio, a Muslim slave trated African Americans' gifts to the who participated in a sixteenth-century world. The pageant began with tremen- Portuguese expedition to the American dous fanfare: four heralds trumpeted and Southwest, landing in the New World called the play to order. to the sound of a constant drumbeat. A veiled Ethiopia followed him and wit- Here ye, hear ~e!Men of all the Americas, nessed his death. The next section and listen to the tale of the eldest and revealed four African American men strongest of the races of mankind, whose who carried foundation stones of the faces be black. Hear ye, hear ye, of the giJts pyramid, inscribed with the words: cot- of black men to this world, the Iron Gtft ton, sugar, tobacco, and rice. Under the and GiJt of Faith, the Pain of Humility direction of Ethiopia, they laid the foun- and the Sorrow Song of Pain, the Gift of dation of the pyramid over the grave of Freedom and of Laughter, and the undying Estevancio. In scene three, eight women Gz? of Hope. Men of the world, keep who were chained together sang "You silence and hear ye this!28 May Bury Me in the East." They carried the stones of service, se~support,religion, Remarkable in its placement of Africans andfdith. The women entombed the at the center of the origins of humankind, bodies of both Estevancio and Ethiopia Du Bois's drama asserted the achieve- in the rising pyramid. ments of African civilization and of black The fourth scene portrayed noted people dispersed around the globe. African Americans, including Benjamin Central to the drama was the veiled Banneker, Toussaint I'Ouverture, Frederick woman known as the All-Mother- Douglass, Booker T. Washington, and Ethiopia in later renditions of the play- Sojourner Truth. Singing "Roll, Jordan, who followed the race from Africa to the Roll," they bore stones marked "Africa New World (fig. 14). At the moment of for Africans," "The Right of All to Vote," emancipation in the final act of the pag- "Equality," and "The Free Woman." In the fifth scene, African American sol- unanimous in agreeing that Thursday's diers, marching to music by Harry program surpassed that of all others." Burleigh, placed stones imprinted with The black newspaper described "tableaux the names of wars and the numbers of depicting early slave life and plantation blacks who fought for American liberty. pastimes on up to the modern develop- Then children singing "Listen to the ment of slave themes cleverly shown on Lambs" entered carrying books, which a specially designed stage."sl In the con- they installed as the capstone of the pyra- text of the pageant, Fuller's Ethiopia, mid. For the finale, the ensemble sang displayed in the pyramidal exhibition composer Samuel Coleridge-Taylor's booth, would have been a symbolic "Onaway." After one of the children lit reminder of Du Bois's fictional Ethiopia the pyramid, Ethiopia and Estevancio rising to claim a new day for African emerged from the tomb, followed by Americans. Egyptians and Ethiopians. The proces- Other African American writers sion exited to the music of Rosamond would turn to the theme of Ethiopia Johnson's "Walk Together Children."30 in plays and pageants, using drama as Du Bois's pageant of music was per- a didactic tool to educate the black formed on November 1 1, 1921, the day populace. Willis Richardson, in Plays before the closing ceremonies of the and Pageantsfi.om the Life of the Negro, America's Making Exposition. Matthew argued that during the 1920s "blacks Henson, the first black explorer to the were taking an action akin to that of North Pole, participated, dressed in "furs writing slave narratives: they were that he wore at the discovery of the recording the history of their own cul- pole." The Chicago Defender hailed the ture and their own interpretation of that pageant as a success, remarking that history." Created predominantly for high "attendants in the various booths who schools, the pageants included Dorothy have witnessed the programs of the C. Guinn's "Out of the Dark," Frances various races during the exhibit were Gunner's "The Light of the Women," Figures portraying the Queen of Sheba, left, Ethiopia, center, and Candace of Meroe from a 19 15 production of "The Star of Ethiopia" pageant in Washington, D.C. From the Crisis (December 19151, p. 90 27 American Art and Edward J. McCoo's "Ethiopia at the Conclusion Bar of Justice."32 In addition to Ethiopia? presence at In his landmark 1903 book The Souls of Du Bois's pageant, Fuller participated in Black Folk, Du Bois wrote that "the shad- at least two other pageants as costume ow of a mighty Negro past flits through designer and artist, creating related the tale of Ethiopia the shadowy and of images. In November 1921, under the Egypt the Sphinx."35 Fuller's Ethiopia auspices of the Women's Service Club in emerged amid intense interest in assert- Boston, she designed the costumes for the ing the primacy and significance of black final act of "The Answer," a pageant writ- culture from ancient Africa. Both Egypt ten by Kathleen M. Easmon, Adelene and Ethiopia played essential roles in Moffat, and Butler Wilson, which shaping racial consciousness and creating appeared to be based on "The Star of a positive and profound history that Ethiopia." It traced the history of blacks transcended the American experience of from Africa to the New World, followed slavery. To fulfill their desire for a future by the protective "Spirit of Africa." In the in American society, blacks had to exca- last scene, a "Temple of Achievement" was vate the past for signs of the important revealed, with Fuller's Ethiopia as a focal position they had played in the creation point.33 of civilization. This quest to assert Dorothy Guinn also based the final African Americans' significance in the tableau of her 1924 pageant "Out of the larger context of world history is at the Dark" on Fuller's Ethiopia. Guinn's pag- core of Fuller's conceptualization; she eant again centered on the emergence of engaged in the construction of a new black civilization from Africa. In episode and powerful image of blackness. four, the chronicler invited representa- Ethiopia, in its allegorical representa- tions of music, literature, science, and art tion of a black woman, also reflected to unveil their treasures. Art, dressed in a African Americans' romanticism in smock and cap, described the glory of developing an idea of Africa. Indeed, African American artists Henry Ossawa Fuller's art, its display, and its role in the Tanner, Albert Alexander Smith, and pageants revealed the depth of African Fuller. The personification of art drew Americans' stake in the mythic construct back a curtain to reveal a living tableau of Egypt and Ethiopia as it related to of Ethiopia. The figure declared: "[Slee, their own history. I believe this idealiza- Ethiopia is awakening and she is begin- tion was necessary to reshape and rede- ning to realize the &ories of her past and fine a community as well as to counter the possibilities of her future. In this stat- standard historical narratives that relegat- ue of Meta Warrick Fuller, see symbolized ed African Americans to the margins and the soul of this people to-day."3* In the projected them as debased and primitive. epilogue, the chorus sang James Weldon A paradox is evident, however, in Johnson's "Lift Every Voice and Sing," Fuller's conception and exhibition of and the tableau of Ethiopia was shown Ethiopia: the style and content of the again. Guinn's pageant and others like sculpture asserted a Pan-African program it sought to represent ancient African while the exhibition of the work revealed origins as essential parts of the African the desire for blacks to prove their American legacy. Fuller's image embodied "Americanness" through participation this quest. in a national civic event. Through their involvement in the America's Making prescient symbol of black identity-. It is Exposition, Johnson, Du Bois, and oth- frequently discussed and reproduced in ers declared and legitimized their place texts on the Harlem Renaissance, and the in the long history of those who helped figure is included in museum exhibitions, to build America. These men saw the fes- most recently in the 1997 traveling exhi- tival, pageant, and Fuller's sculpture as a bition Rhapsodies in Bhck: Art of the means to rewrite the narrative of race Harlem Renaissance and in the Whitney and nation so that they could be per- Museum of American Art's 2000 exhibi- ceived as productive citizens worthy of tion The American Century: Art and inclusion. Culture 1900-1950. Ethiopia remains an In 1921 Fuller's statue proclaimed that important and potent marker that helps African Americans were awakening to us to locate black history in time and their power and testified to the transfor- space, signaling the continuing struggle mation of a people liberated by the dawn toward self-determination by people of of a new century. Today Ethiopia is still a the African diaspora. Notes A version of this essay was presented at relations. Fuller did not date her works, College and Rizmli lnternational the 2001 conference "Laying Claim: and no documentation or provenance Publications Inc., 1996), 106; and (Re)ConsideringArtists of African Descent survives for the versions held by the Richard Powell, "ReIBirth of a Nation," in the Americas," which was held at Schomburg Center. The earliest surviv- in Rhapsodies in Black: Art of the Harkm Colgate University. An ACLSIHenry Luce ing photograph appeared in The Book Renaissance (London: Hayward Gallery, Foundation Dissertation Fellowship in of the America? Making Exposition, 7Ist Institute of International Visual Arts, American Art aided my research. Many Regiment Armory New York, October 1997), 18. thanks to Sally Promey and David Driskell 29-November 12, I921 (New York: City for their patient reading and support. and State Departments of Education, 4 For biographical information on Fuller, Thanks also to Judith Wilson and Erika 1921), where the work was titled see William Francis O'Donnell, "Meta Doss, who encouraged me to publish my Ethiopia. The same photograph was Vaux Warrick, Sculptor of Horrors: work. 1 am grateful to Martha Bari, reproduced in the July 1923 issue of The Negro Girl Whose Productions Adrienne Childs, and Wendy Grossman Opportunity as Ethiopia Awakening and Are Being Compared to Rodin's," World for their comments and to the anonymous in the March 1939 issue of the Negro To-Day 13, no. 5 (November 1907): reviewers of American Art for their thought- History Bulletin as The Awakening of 1 139-45; Benjamin Brawley, "Meta ful suggestions. Ethiopia. In 1923 Fuller also exhibited Warrick Fuller," Southern Workman 47 this version at the Annual Exhibition of (January 19 18): 25-32; Sylvia Dannett, 1 Transcript of interview with Meta the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts, "Meta Vaux Warrick Fuller," in Profiles Warrick Fuller, 7 and 8 April 1964, Philadelphia. For detailed discussion of ofNegro Womanhood vol. 2 (Yonkers, Sylvia G. L. Dannett Papers, the various casts, see RenCe Ater, "Race, N.Y.: Educational Heritage Inc., 1966), Livingstone College, Salisbury, N.C. Gender, and Nation: Rethinking the 31-46; and Judith Nina Kerr, "God- Sculpture of Meta Warrick Fuller" Given Work: The Life and Times of 2 The known versions are: (1) the first (Ph.D. diss., University of Maryland, Sculptor Meta Vaux Warrick Fuller, sketch, known only from photographs, ZOOO), 157-62. 1877-1968" (Ph.D. diss., University with the left hand at a ninety-degree of Massachusetts, 1986). angle to the figure's bound legs; see fig. 3 See David Driskell, "The Flowering of the 12; (2) the sixty-seven-inch plaster Harlem Renaissance: The Art of Aaron 5 Fuller to Murray, 31 January 1916, figure at the Schomburg Center for Douglas, Meta Warrick Fuller, Palmer Freeman Henry Morris Murray Papers, Research in Black Culture, New York; see Hayden, and William H. Johnson," in Manuscript Division, Moorland- frontis-piece, fig. 5 (3) a bronze cast in Harkm Renaissance: Art of Black America Spingarn Research Center, Howard the same collection with the left hand (New York: Studio Museum in Harlem University, Washington, D.C. (here- moved flush to the figure's side, an and Harry N. Abrams Inc., 1987), 108; after Murray Papers). apparent error about which Fuller com- Judith Wilson, "Hagar's Daughters: Social plained to the Ostercamp-Mead foundry History, Cultural Heritage, and Afro-U.S. 6 "A Proposed Exhibition and Pageant in October 1927; and (4) a number of Women's Art," in Bearing Witness: Con- Illustrating the Part Which the thirteen-inch-high "stone and plaster" temporary Works by Afiican American American Negro Has Played in the casts made in the 1960s as gifts for WomenArtists (New York: Spelman Making of America," undated, reel 9, 29 American Art W. E. B. Du Bois Papers, Manuscript mistakenly wrote that Fuller created and Elliott P. Skinner, Afiican Division, Library of Congress, Wash- the work for the 1889 New York State Americans and US. Policy TowardAfiica ington, D.C. (hereafter Du Bois Centennial. 185&1924: In Defense of Black Papers). Nationality (Washington, D.C.: Howard 12 See Christiane Ziegler, Jean-Marcel Univ. Press, 1992), 275-83. 7 "The Looking Glass," Crisis 23, no. 1 Humbert, and Michael Pantazzi, (November 1921): 29, and Fuller to Egyptomania: Egypt in Western Art, 17 Imanuel Geiss, The Pan-Afican Mrs. W. P. Hedden, 5 October 1921, 1730-1930 (Ottawa: National Gallery Movement: A History of Pan-Afiicanism Meta Warrick Fuller Papers, Manu- of Canada, 1994); James Stevens Curl, in America, Europe andAfiica, trans. script, Archives, and Rare Books Egptomania: The Egyptian Revival: A Ann Keep (New York: Africana Division, Schomburg Center for Rearring Theme in the History of Taste Publishing Co., 1974), 132-59; William Research in Black Culture, New York (Manchester, England: Manchester Univ. R. Scott, The Sons of Sheba: Afiican- Public Library, New York City (here- Press, 1994); Bernadette M. Sigler, The Americans and the Italo-Ethiopian War, after Fuller Papers). Sphinx and the Lotus: The Egptian 1935-1941 (Bloomington: Indiana Movementin American Decorative Arts Univ. Press, 1993), 12-22; and "Miss 8 For references to archaeological excava- 186S1935(Yonkers, N.Y.: Hudson Francis Watkins," Frederick Douglas' tions in Ethiopia, see M. D. Maclean, River Museum, 1990); and Donald Paper, 24 August 1855. "African Civilization," Crisis 1, no. 5 Kuspit, "Our Egypt," Art in America 67, (March 191 1): 23-25; "Excavations no. 2 (March-April 1979): 86-93. More 18 J. E. Casely Hayford, Ethiopia Unbound in Ethiopia," Crisis 2, no. 4 (August recently, the 1979 King Tutankhamun (19 1 1; reprint, London: Frank Cass and 191 1): 169; and Maud Cuney Hare, traveling exhibition sparked "Tutmania" Co. Ltd., 1969). Judith Wilson has sug- "Ethiopian Art," Crisis 22, no. 6 (Octo- in America. gested that Fuller may have known of ber 1921): 259. Casely Hayford's book. She writes, 13 Nicholas Hudson, "From 'Nation' to "Fuller has produced an image remark- 9 Pauline de Souza has proposed a link 'Race': The Origin of Racial Class- ably congruent with the title of Casely between Fuller's sculoture and the ification in Eighteenth-Century Hayford's book-that is, an image of Egyptian goddess Isis, asserting that Thought," Eighteenth-Century Studies 'Ethiopia (-in-the-process-of-becoming-) Fuller's Ethiopia is Isis, based on an 29, no. 3 (spring 1996): 247-64; and Unbound.'" See Wilson, "Hagar's unseen tiet, or knot of Isis, said to be Stephen Jay Gould, "American Polygeny Daughters," 106. It is possible that located in the folds of Isis's garment and Craniometry before Darwin: Fuller knew of the text, either through between her breasts. She links her inter- Blacks and Indians as Separate, Inferior her connections to Du Bois or relation- pretation of Ethiopia as Isis to the liter- Species," in The "Racial" Economy of ship with her psychiatrist husband, an ary work of Du Bois. See Pauline de Science: Toward a Democratic Future, ed. expatriate from Liberia. Fuller had met Souza, "Black Awakening: Gender Sandra Harding (Bloomington: Indiana Casely Hayford's ex-wife, Adelaide, in and Representation in the Harlem Univ. Press, 1993), 84-1 15. 1921 while working on the pageant Renaissance," in Women Artists and "The Answer." Adelaide writes: "It was Modernism, ed. Katy Deepwell (Man- 14 See C. F. Volney, The Ruins: or, Med- at Boston that we spent a memorable chester, England: Manchester Univ. itations on the Revolutions of Empires: day in the home of Mrs. Meta Warwick Press, 1998), 64. and the Law of Nature, 1802, quoted Fuller, the eminent sculptor." Adelaide in Dickson D. Bruce Jr., "Ancient M. Cromwell, Afiican Victorian 10 Fuller to Murray, 8 February 19 15, Africa and the Early Black American Feminist: The Life and Times ofAdelaide Murray Papers, and Freeman Henry Historians, 1883-1 91 5," American Smith Case4 Hayfird (London: Frank Morris Murray, Emancipation and the Quarterly 36, no. 5 (winter 1984): Cass, 1986), 114. Freed in American Sculpture (19 16; 689-90; and Gould, "American reprint, Freeport, N.Y.: Books for Polygeny and Craniometry Before 19 W. E. B. Du Bois, The Negro (191 5; Libraries Press, 1972), 137-38. Darwin," 99-1 1 1. reprint, Mineola, N.Y.: Dover Publi- cations Inc., 2001), 17-26, and Eric J. 11 Murray, Emancipation and the Freed in 15 Edith R. Sanders, "The Hamitic Sundquist, To Wake the Nations: Race in American Sculpture, 140, and Fuller to Hypothesis: Its Origins and Functions the Making ofAmerican Literature Murray, 9 January 1915, 5 April 1915, in Time Perspective," Journal of Afiican (Cambridge, Mass.: Belknap Press of and 1 September 1915, Murray Papers. History 10, no. 4 (1969): 521-32, Harvard Univ. Press, 1993), 567. Ethiopia was correctly dated until 1940, and August Meier, Negro Thought in when Locke reproduced the full-size America, 1880-1315: Racial Ideologies 20 "America's Making: A Festival and laster and dated it to 1914 in his The in the Age of Booker I: Washington Exhibit," flyer, Du Bois Papers; "Outline Negro in Art. He also suggested that (Ann Arbor: Univ. of Michigan Press, of Scope of Exhibit," box 20, People's the work was made of bronze when in 1963), 51. Institute Records, Rare Book and fact it was plaster painted to resemble Manuscript Division, New York Public bronze, a technique favored by Fuller, 16 Sylvia M. Jacobs, The Afiican Nexus: Library; "Foreword," The Book of who was often unable to afford having Black American Perspectives on the America; Making Exposition, n.p.; and her work cast in bronze. James Porter, European Partitioning ofAfiica, Ilana Abramovitch, "America's Making in his 1943 Modern Negro Art, repro- 1880-1920 (Westport, Conn.: Exposition and Festival (New York, duced the same photograph and Greenwood Press, 198 l), 187-203; 1921): Immigrant Gifts on the Altar of America (Multiculturalism)" (Ph.D. Higham, Strangers in the Land: Patterns Black People," Crisis 12, no. 4 (August diss., New York University, 1996), 14. ofAmerican Nativism 1860-1925 (1955; 1916): 171. reprint, Westport, Conn.: Greenwood 21 "Our Organization," in The Book of Press, 1981); and Thomas Cripps, Slow 30 "A Proposed Exhibition and Pageant Americai Making Exposition, n.p., and Fade to Black: The Negro in American Illustrating the Part Which the American "33 Groups to Show America's Making," Film, 1900-1942 (New York: Oxford Negro Has Played in the Making of New York Times, 9 October 1921, sec. 2, Univ. Press, 1993), 41-69. America," Du Bois Papers. p. 4. 25 James Weldon Johnson, "Views and 31 "Matt Henson and Other Artists in 22 "Hylan Praises the Melting Pot," New Reviews: 'America's Making' and the Historic Pageant," Chicago Defender, 19 York Times, 21 October 1921,3; "Pageant Colored People," New York Age, 20 November 1921, 3. Pictures America's Making," New York August 1921, 4. Times, 30 October 1921, 17; "Many Lay 32 "Introduction," in Plays and Pageants Claim to Finding America," New York 26 'A Proposed Exhibition and Pageant fiom the Life of the Negro, ed. Willis Times, 31 October 1921, 15; and "Races Illustrating the Part Which the Richardson (1930; reprint, Jackson: Clash Over 'America's Makers,"' New York American Negro Has Played in the Univ. Press of Mississippi, 1993), xxxvi. Times, 1 November 1921, 19. Making of America," Du Bois Papers. 33 Kathleen M. Easmon, Adelene Moffat, 23 "Memorandum of Understanding with 27 "Negro Represented in 'America's and Butler R. Wilson, "The Answer: A Racial Groups," 23 December 1920, Making,"' New York Age, 5 November Symbolic Pageant Showing the Contribu- People's Institute Records. 1921, 8, and Eugene Kinckle Jones to tion to America's Growth and Greatness John Finley, 23 November 1921, box made by the Negroes," 29 November 24 See David Glassberg, American 5 1, John Huston Finley Papers, Rare 1921, synopsis and program, Fuller Papers. Historical Pageantry: The Use of Tradition Book and Manuscript Division, New in Early Twentieth Century (Chapel Hill: York Public Library. 34 Dorothy Guinn, "Out of the Dark," in Univ. of North Carolina Press), 132. For Plays and Pageantsfiorn the Life of the a discussion of the climate of the time, 28 W. E. B. Du Bois, "The National Negro, 322. see Rayford W. Logan, The Betrayal of Emancipation Exposition," Crisis 6, the Negro: From Rutheford B. Hayes to no. 7 (November 1913): 339. 35 W. E. B Du Bois, The Souls of Black Folk, Woodrow Wilson (1954; reprint, New in Three Negro Classics (1903; reprint, York: Da Capo Press, 1997); John 29 W. E. B. Du Bois, "The Drama Among New York: Avon Books, 1965), 2 17. 3 1 American Art