William Pickens

William Pickens
Born William Pickens
(1881-01-15)January 15, 1881
Anderson County, South Carolina
Died April 6, 1954(1954-04-06) (aged 73)
Nationality African-American
Occupation orator, educator, journalist, essayist

William Pickens (15 January 1881 – 6 April 1954) was an African-American orator, educator, journalist, and essayist. He wrote two autobiographies, first The Heir of Slaves, in 1911 and second Bursting Bonds in 1923, in which he mentioned race- motivated attacks on African Americans. both in the urban riots of 1919 and by lynching in 1921.[1]

Biography

Pickens, the son of freed slaves was born on January 15, 1881 in South Carolina but mostly raised in Arkansas.[2]

He studied at multiple schools. He received bachelor's degrees from Talladega College (1902) and Yale University (1904), where he was inducted into Phi Beta Kappa and awarded the Henry James Ten Eyek Prize;[2] a master's degree from Fisk University (1908); and a Litt.D from Selma University in 1915.[1] He married the former Minnie Cooper McAlpin(e), and they had three children.[1][2] Pickens was a Methodist.[1] He was buried at sea while vacationing with his wife on the RMS Mauretania.[2]

Career

Educational career

Pickens was fluent in and instructed several languages, including Latin, Greek, German, and Esperanto. He taught at his first alma mater, Talladega College, then at Wiley College. He was also a professor of sociology and a college dean at Morgan State College. He was the most popular black orators in the America between the first and second World Wars. As he was the field secretary and director of branches in NAACP (1920-1940).

NAACP

Pickens was also an active and vocal member of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP). Pickens was initially considered for the position of field secretary by the association, but instead it was given to James Weldon Johnson in December 1916. On January 12, 1920, Pickens was given the opportunity for the position of assistant field secretary by the NAACP executive secretary, John R. Shillady. Pickens finished teaching for the academic year at Morgan College, while concurrently accepting the position, which provided a $3,000 salary. He also served as a director of branches, 1920 – 1940. [3]

January 15, 1923, Pickens joined the eight people group and sent the “ Garvey Must Go” letter to the U. S. August, 1927, Pickens wrote a letter to the New Republic called Garvey’s release from prison.

Later on he would hold the position of field secretary, and then in the Treasury Departments Savings Bonds Division, 1941 – 1950, as director of the interracial section.[3]

Pickens once said, “Color had been made the mark of enslavement and was taken to be also the mark of inferiority; for prejudice does not reason, or it would not be prejudice… If prejudice could reason, it would dispel itself.”[4]

U.S. Treasury

He also served on the U.S. Treasury's Defense Savings He wrote two autobiographies: The Heir of Slaves (1910/11) and Bursting Bonds (1923). As he was the field secretary and director of branches in NAACP (1920-1940). Pickens had the most direct contact with the Negro masses than any other African American leaders in his time, and that was because he was the director of the interracial section of the Treasury Department’s Saving Bonds Division (1941-1950)[5]

Other

His address "Misrule in Hayti" won him the Ten Eyck Prize for oratory, but he would renounce its ideas ten years later. The address led to a conflict between him, Monroe Trotter, and Booker T. Washington.[3]

Bibliography

References

  1. 1 2 3 4 Dumain, Ralph. William Pickens (1881-1954) at Who’s Who in Colored America
  2. 1 2 3 4 Okocha, Victor. Pickens, William (1881-1954) at blackpast.org,
  3. 1 2 3 Avery, Sheldon. Up From Washington:William Pickens and the Negro Struggle for Equality, 1900-1954 (illustrated ed.). University of Delaware Press, 1989. pp. 9, 10, 16, 56. ISBN 0874133610. Retrieved 25 May 2016.
  4. ↑ "Back to Online Encyclopedia Index". BlackPast.org.
  5. ↑ Avery, Sheldon (1989). William Pickens and the Negro Struggle for Equality. University of Delaware Press. pp. 10–15.

Further reading

External links

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