Charles L. Blockson Afro-American Collection

The Charles L. Blockson Afro-American Collection is a unique repository of major and minor documents representing African and African American history and culture. The collection was founded by Charles L. Blockson, who began collecting African books when he was 14 years old. After his teacher told him that history showed there was only a handful of notable black Americans, young Blockson decided to prove her wrong. He began to gather books about people of African descent and their history by going to thrift shops, used book stores, and church bazaars, as well as the Salvation Army and Goodwill stores; Blockson found that “even trash cans in alleyways” would occasionally have treasures.

Collecting books and artifacts that document African American culture and history became Blockson's lifelong passion. In 1984, he donated his collection of over 20,000 books and documents to Temple University in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania to form the Charles L. Blockson Afro-American Collection. Today the Blockson Collection contains over 100,000 books, journals, pamphlets, manuscripts, photographs and prints, drawings, sheet music, broadsides, posters, and artifacts. In addition, information contained in brochures, flyers, newspapers and magazine clippings, and ephemera is available in the Collection's Vertical Files. A catalogue of the Blockson Collection was published in 1990.

The Blockson Collection covers all phases of Afro-Americana from 1600 to present, including materials on black people of countries other than the United States. Among the numerous resources in the Collection are the following groups of materials:

The Slave Narrative Collection. Included here are narratives of black former slaves such as Olaudah Equiano, Ignatius Sancho, Prince Lee Boo, Sojourner Truth, and Frederick Douglass.

The Photographs and Prints Collection. Features images of African American Civil rights leaders, religious leaders, artists, entertainers, educators, and images of major historical events in African American history. The John W. Mosley Photograph Collection, which provides images of notable black entertainers, [Page 183]the old Negro League players, social and political personalities, and the general black social and cultural life in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, is a distinctive part of the photographs and prints collection.

The Paul Robeson Collection. Contains concert clippings, recitals, performance programs, photographs, posters, and sheet music pertaining to Robeson's life and career.

Sheet Music Collection. Represents popular music, jazz, and folk music.

Other important research materials in the Blockson Collection are letters, papers, correspondence, and memorabilia. Outstanding among these are related to Bishop Richard R. Wright, William Still, Frederick Douglass, Langston Hughes, and James Baldwin. Of special significance are Haitian presidential papers from Henri Christophe to the Duvaliers.

Among the treasured items at the Blockson Collection are many rare and out-of-print books. Some of these volumes include Corippus Africani Grammaticus, a description of Africa (1581); Anthology of the Poems of Phillis Wheatley (1773); Confessions of Nat Turner, describing his role in the 1831 slave uprising; The Bible in Defense of Slavery, an 1851 publication that uses biblical passages to justify slavery; and a novel, Clotel; or, the President's Daughter (1853). The Collection also offers readers first editions of works by George Washington Williams, Frances Ellen Watkins Harper, Paul Lawrence Dunbar, W.E.B. Du Bois, Carter G. Woodson, and others.

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