|
|
|
|
| |
|
April 14, 2003 -
December 6, 2003
"C.C. CAMP IS A SWELL PLACE FOR A BOY TO LEARN."
Recording Our History: Writers and Artists
Art for the People
For Teachers
Resources |
Ex-Slave Narratives
In November 1936, the Virginia Writers' Project formed an
all-black unit under the direction of Roscoe E. Lewis. The objectives
of the Virginia Negro Studies Project, based at Hampton Institute (now
Hampton University) and consisting of sixteen workers, were to provide
employment for educated African Americans on relief and to collect and
publish material on African American life in Virginia from Jamestown
to the present. During the next year more than 300 former slaves were
interviewed. The interviews, plus research in libraries and
courthouses, resulted in the publication of The Negro in Virginia in
1940.
|
Recording Spirituals Sung by Ex-Slaves, Petersburg |
From 1937 to 1942, Lewis and members of the Negro Studies Project
made approximately 200 recordings in and around Hampton, Newport News,
and Petersburg. Although many of these were narratives and stories of
former slaves, Lewis and his group captured performances of some
musicians, including quartets, choirs, blues singers, and former
slaves singing in groups and individually. The Virginia Writers'
Project collected texts of more than 2,700 songs. |
|
|
|
