W.E.B. Du Bois (1868-1963) devoted his life to fighting for equality, freedom, and racial and economic justice. Born in Great Barrington on Church Street, his family and community sparked his interest in democracy and African American culture, and he remained connected to the town for the rest of his life.
Du Bois was the first African American to earn a Ph.D. from Harvard. He authored numerous books focusing on African Americans within American culture and history. “The problem of the twentieth century is the problem of the color-line – the relation of the darker to the lighter races of men in Asia and Africa, in America and the islands of the sea,” he wrote in his most well known work, The Souls of Black Folk (1903). In 1905, in Niagara Falls, Du Bois helped organize the first of several annual meetings of African American leaders fighting for civil rights, which became known as “the Niagara Movement” and paved the way for the the founding of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People in 1909. Between 1910 and 1934, he edited the NAACP’s magazine, The Crisis, publishing young undiscovered African American poets such as Langston Hughes.
Du Bois travelled across Europe, Russia, Asia, and Africa, and was outspoken in his belief that people across the world had the right to self determination, democracy, and freedom from exploitation. He was extremely concerned by the threat of nuclear war, and at the height of the Cold War, chaired the Peace Information Center, an organization that advocated cooperation with the Soviet Union for nuclear disarmament. This led to his placement under surveillance and eventual arrest by the FBI, tarnishing his reputation as an African American civil rights leader within the United States. Du Bois was also deeply involved in decolonization movements in Africa, and he helped organize five Pan African Congresses between 1919 and 1945, where representatives from African countries demanded their independence from European colonizers. In the early 1960s, he was invited by President Kwame Nkrumah to move to a newly independent Ghana, where he died in 1963.
Du Bois tirelessly advocated for voter’s rights, ending racial discrimination, worker’s rights, self-governance for the nations of Africa, and nuclear disarmament. Today, he is regarded as the architect of the modern civil rights movement.
Du Bois was the first African American to earn a Ph.D. from Harvard. He authored numerous books focusing on African Americans within American culture and history. “The problem of the twentieth century is the problem of the color-line – the relation of the darker to the lighter races of men in Asia and Africa, in America and the islands of the sea,” he wrote in his most well known work, The Souls of Black Folk (1903). In 1905, in Niagara Falls, Du Bois helped organize the first of several annual meetings of African American leaders fighting for civil rights, which became known as “the Niagara Movement” and paved the way for the the founding of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People in 1909. Between 1910 and 1934, he edited the NAACP’s magazine, The Crisis, publishing young undiscovered African American poets such as Langston Hughes.
Du Bois travelled across Europe, Russia, Asia, and Africa, and was outspoken in his belief that people across the world had the right to self determination, democracy, and freedom from exploitation. He was extremely concerned by the threat of nuclear war, and at the height of the Cold War, chaired the Peace Information Center, an organization that advocated cooperation with the Soviet Union for nuclear disarmament. This led to his placement under surveillance and eventual arrest by the FBI, tarnishing his reputation as an African American civil rights leader within the United States. Du Bois was also deeply involved in decolonization movements in Africa, and he helped organize five Pan African Congresses between 1919 and 1945, where representatives from African countries demanded their independence from European colonizers. In the early 1960s, he was invited by President Kwame Nkrumah to move to a newly independent Ghana, where he died in 1963.
Du Bois tirelessly advocated for voter’s rights, ending racial discrimination, worker’s rights, self-governance for the nations of Africa, and nuclear disarmament. Today, he is regarded as the architect of the modern civil rights movement.