Benjamin Muse Papers
| Creator | Benjamin Muse |
| Description | Papers of Benjamin Muse, politician, journalist, experimental farmer, and civil rights activist. In 1959 Muse was given a post on the Southern Regional Council (formerly the Committee on Interracial Cooperation) and was director of their leadership project from 1959-1964. Included in the collection are fifteen speeches on the race question delivered in various places in the South. Also are drafts and notes on three of his books dealing with race relations: Virginia’s Massive Resistance, Ten Years of Prelude, and The American Negro Revolution. Of particular interest is the “Memoranda,” reports issued to the SRC on his conversations with Southern leaders and observations on race relations made during the five years he spent traveling through the South, when integration and the Civil Rights Movement were having their biggest impact. While predominantly conversations with white men, these reports provided detailed accounts of school desegregation, lunch counter sit-ins, and student activism throughout the south. As such they provide context for the lives of southern African-American women in the early 1960s. |
| Call number | |
| Date from | 1919 |
| Date to | 1973 |
| Geographic school | Reston, VA |
| Size | 747 Items |
| Access restrictions yes/no | |
| Access restrictions | |
| Part Of larger collection yes/no | |
| Larger collection title | |
| URL | |
| Repository | Duke Special Collection Library, Sallie Bingham Center for Women’s History and Culture |
| Repository address | David M. Rubenstein Rare Book & Manuscript Library, Box 90185, Duke University Durham, NC 27708-0185 |
| Repository contact name | Kelly Wooten |
| Repository contact title | |
| Repository contact email | http://library.duke.edu/rubenstein/ask/index.html |
| Repository contact phone | (919) 660-5967 |
| DoveRegion | (outside of Virginia) |
| Subjects | o African American students
o African Americans–Civil rights o African Americans–Segregation o Public schools o Race relations o School children o School closings o School integration o School integration–Massive resistance movement o Segregation in education o Muse, Benjamin o Southern Regional Council |
| Types | o Correspondence
o Legal documents |