SCLC Places Archive at Emory
Emory University and the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC) announced today that the SCLC has placed its archive with Emory's Manuscript, Archives, and Rare Book Library (MARBL).
"Emory is delighted to care for, catalog and share this unique intellectual resource with visitors from around the city and the world," says Emory Provost Earl Lewis. "SCLC played a signal role in the nation's struggles over civil rights. By helping to preserve that legacy we honor the past by connecting it to the present and the future."
"Placing the SCLC archive with Emory ensures that the organization's materials will enrich understanding of history, culture and non-violence for generations to come," says SCLC President Charles Steele.
The SCLC was co-founded in New Orleans, La., on Feb. 14, 1957, by Martin Luther King, Jr. and other African American leaders from across the South with the purpose of advancing the cause of racial equality. Its archive, contained in 1,100 boxes, is the second-largest collection placed with MARBL, surpassed in size only by the Sam Nunn congressional archive. The bulk of the SCLC materials date from 1968 to 1977, during the terms of SCLC's two longest-serving presidents: Ralph David Abernathy and Joseph Lowery.
Included in the archive are correspondence; press releases, speeches and other SCLC staff writings; SCLC publications; membership records; clippings and other collected print materials; photographs; audio cassette tapes; and videotapes. Some highlights of the collection include:
• Photographs documenting aspects of the Civil Rights movement such as voter registration workshops, Freedom Summer and the Freedom Schools.
• A number of drafts of speeches by Ralph Abernathy and others, many heavily annotated in the hands of their authors.
• Thousands of sympathy cards and letters expressing grief and outrage at the assassination of Martin Luther King Jr.
• Letters from individuals and organizations from across the nation seeking assistance in local political organization or help in dealing with violations of civil rights.
The archive will complement the SCLC papers, most pre-1968, that are held by the King Library and Archives at the King Center in Atlanta. They also will enhance the holdings of African American and civil rights collections throughout Atlanta.