Alain LeRoy Locke: The Father of the Harlem Renaissance

Photo of Alain Leroy Locke (b. 9/13/1885 - d. 6/9/1954)

Alain Leroy Locke was born on September 13, 1885 in Philadelphia, the only child of Pliny Ishmael Locke and Mary Hawkins Locke. His father was a schoolteacher and graduate of Howard University Law School. In his youth, Locke struggled with rheumatic fever, which left him with permanent heart damage. This condition physically restricted him and led him to pursue more greatly the quieter intellectual activities of reading and studying.

Locke attended Central High School in Philadelphia from 1898 to 1902. He graduated first in his class from Philadelphia School of Pedagogy, a teacher's college, where he earned a Bachelor's degree. He completed Harvard College's four-year course in three years. By 1907, Locke received his Bachelor of Arts degree magna cum laude, was elected to Phi Beta Kappa and earned the prestigious Bowdoin Prize for an English essay. Additionally, he was selected as the first person of African descent to receive the distinction of Rhodes Scholar from Oxford University -- after rigorous  examinations in Greek, Latin and mathematics.

From 1910 to 1911, Locke began studying at the University of Berlin as a graduate student. He started writing about racism, African colonialism and the arts while studying in Europe. In 1912, Locke returned to the United States and joined the faculty of Howard University where he would later become chairman of its philosophy department. He would work at Howard University for 40 years. During his early teaching career at Howard University, Locke pursued a doctorate which he earned in 1918 from Harvard University.



The New Negro: Voices of the Harlem Renaissance, edited by Alain Locke, available at Amazon.com

The New Negro was published in 1925 and had a significant impact on the dialogue of Black cultural achievements, which brought him national recognition. In The New Negro, Locke examined the famous Harlem Renaissance for the general reading public. It also became a platform where he attacked the legacy of European supremacy by pointing out the great achievements of Africans. The publication of the book and its acclaim would place Locke at the forefront of "The New Negro Movement."

Alain Leroy Locke, by Winold Reiss, 1925.

Locke received many honors and was in great demand as a writer and lecturer around the country.  A passionate collector of African art and champion of Black theater (Plays of Negro Life, published in 1927), Locke became one of the world's foremost scholars in African studies. In 1954, Howard University started its African Studies Program. It was not a new concept. Thirty years earlier Locke suggested the program to the Howard University administration.

In 1953, Locke moved to New York City after his retirement from Howard University. The next year, on June 9, 1954, he suffered a fatal heart attack derived from his life-long heart problems. As a patron of the arts, Locke's legacy on African American history and culture would impact many generations to come and he would become known as the Father of the Harlem Renaissance.

Langston Hughes: The Long Tradition of Black Poets

Langston Hughes (James Mercer Langston Hughes) was born February 1, 1902 in Joplin, Missouri to James Nathaniel Hughes and his wife Caroline Mercer Langston, a school teacher. Hughes became a great African American poet, short story writer, novelist, and columnist. Along with such scribes as Claude McKay and W.E.B. Du Bois, Hughes' works had a great influence on the Harlem Renaissance in the USA and the Négritude movement in France and francophone Africa and the Caribbeans. Brother Hughes died May 22, 1967.

In this picture, standing center right, is Hughes as member of the Meschrabpam's American Negro Film Group, includes writer Dorothy West (seated right), on board the Europa on June 17, 1932.

The Negro Mother, a poem by Langston Hughes

Children, I come back today
To tell you a story of the long dark way
That I had to climb, that I had to know
In order that the race might live and grow.
Look at my face -- dark as the night --
Yet shining like the sun with love's true light.
I am the dark girl who crossed the red sea
Carrying in my body the seed of the free.
I am the woman who worked in the field
Bringing the cotton and the corn to yield.
I am the one who labored as a slave,
Beaten and mistreated for the work that I gave --
Children sold away from me, I'm husband sold, too.
No safety, no love, no respect was I due.


Three hundred years in the deepest South:
But God put a song and a prayer in my mouth.
God put a dream like steel in my soul.
Now, through my children, I'm reaching the goal.


Now, through my children, young and free,
I realized the blessing deed to me.
I couldn't read then. I couldn't write.
I had nothing, back there in the night.
Sometimes, the valley was filled with tears,
But I kept trudging on through the lonely years.
Sometimes, the road was hot with the sun,
But I had to keep on till my work was done:
I had to keep on! No stopping for me --
I was the seed of the coming Free.
I nourished the dream that nothing could smother
Deep in my breast -- the Negro mother.
I had only hope then , but now through you,
Dark ones of today, my dreams must come true:
All you dark children in the world out there,
Remember my sweat, my pain, my despair.
Remember my years, heavy with sorrow --
And make of those years a torch for tomorrow.
Make of my pass a road to the light
Out of the darkness, the ignorance, the night.
Lift high my banner out of the dust.
Stand like free men supporting my trust.
Believe in the right, let none push you back.
Remember the whip and the slaver's track.
Remember how the strong in struggle and strife
Still bar you the way, and deny you life --
But march ever forward, breaking down bars.
Look ever upward at the sun and the stars.
Oh, my dark children, may my dreams and my prayers
Impel you forever up the great stairs --
For I will be with you till no white brother
Dares keep down the children of the Negro Mother.

DEMOCRACY

Democracy will not come
Today, this year
        Nor ever
Through compromise and fear.

I have as much right
As the other fellow has
       To stand
On my two feet
And own the land.

I tire so of hearing people say,
Let things take their course.
Tomorrow is another day.
I do not need my freedom
       When I'm dead.
I cannot live on tomorrow's
bread.
          Freedom
          Is a strong seed
          Planted
          In a great need.
          I live here, too.
          I want freedom
          Just as you.

- Langston Hughes