African American Women on Race - 1902

In 1902, Dr. Daniel Wallace Culp published a book of essays on various issues facing African Americans of the day. The full title was Twentieth Century Negro Literature or A Cyclopedia of Thought on the Vital Topics Relating to the American Negro by One Hundred of America's Greatest Negroes. Included in the book were the following essays by African American women, which have been reproduced here on this site (list is alphabetical by the last name of the author):

Ariel S. Bowen

Is the Young Negro an Improvement, Morally, on His Father?
Ariel S. Bowen Essay

Rosa D. Bowser

What Role Is the Educated Negro Woman to Play in the Uplifting of Her Race?
Rosa D. Bowser Essay

Alice Dunbar-Nelson (Mrs. Paul L. Dunbar)

Is It Time for the Negro Colleges in the South to Be Put Into the Hands of Negro Teachers?
Alice Dunbar-Nelson Essay

Lena T. Jackson

The Negro As a Laborer
Lena T. Jackson Essay

Mrs. Warren Logan (Adella Hunt Logan)

What Are the Causes of the Great Mortality Among the Negroes of the Cities of the South, and How Is That Mortality to Be Lessened?
Mrs. Warren Logan Essay

Lena Mason

The Negro and Education
Lena Mason Essay

Sarah Dudley Pettey

What Role Is the Educated Negro Woman to Play in the Uplifting of Her Race?
Sarah Dudley Pettey Essay

Mary E. C. Smith

Is the Negro As Morally Depraved As He Is Reputed to Be?
Mary E. C. Smith Essay

Rosetta Douglass Sprague

What Role Is the Educated Negro Woman to Play in the Uplifting of Her Race?
Rosetta Douglass Sprague Essay

Mary B. Talbert

Did the Negro Make, in the Nineteenth Century, Achievements Along the Lines of Wealth, Morality, Education, Etc., Commensurate with His Opportunities? If So, What Achievements Did He Make?
Mary B. Talbert Essay

Mary Church Terrell

What Role Is the Educated Negro Woman to Play in the Uplifting of Her Race?
Mary Church Terrell Essay

Josephine Silone Yates

Did the Negro Make, in the Nineteenth Century, Achievements Along the Lines of Wealth, Morality, Education, Etc., Commensurate with His Opportunities? If So, What Achievements Did He Make?
Josephine Silone Yates Essay

Men represented in the volume include such well-known African Americans as George Washington Carver and Booker T. Washington, and many other educators, ministers, and others.

More about Culp's project: The following excerpt is from the preface of the volume, and shows the purposes which Culp hoped to address:

The object of this book is, therefore: (1) To enlighten the uninformed white people on the intellectual ability of the Negro. (2) To give to those, who are interested in the Negro race, a better idea of the extent to which he contributed to the promotion of America's civilization, and of the intellectual attainments made by him in the nineteenth century. (3) To reflect the views of the most scholarly and prominent Negroes of America on those topics, touching the Negro, that are now engaging the attention of the civilized world. (4) To point out, to the aspiring Negro youth, those men and women of their own race who, by their scholarship, by their integrity of character, and by their earnest efforts in the work of uplifting their own race, have made themselves illustrious; also, to enlighten such youth on those ethical, political, and sociological questions, touching the Negro that will sooner or later engage their attention. (5) To enlighten the Negroes on that perplexing problem, commonly called the "Race Problem," that has necessarily grown out of their contact with their ex-masters and their descendants; and also to stimulate them to make greater efforts to ascend to that plane of civilization occupied by the other enlightened peoples of the world.