W. E. B. Du Bois (1868–1963) was an American
sociologist,
historian and
civil rights activist. The first
African American to earn a doctorate from
Harvard, he became a professor of history, sociology and economics at
Atlanta University. He rose to national prominence as the leader of the
Niagara Movement, a group of African-American activists who wanted equal rights for blacks, and was one of the co-founders of the
NAACP in 1909. He wrote one of the first scientific treatises in the field of American sociology, and published three autobiographies.
Black Reconstruction in America (1935) challenged the prevailing orthodoxy that blacks were responsible for the failures of the
Reconstruction era. On August 28, 1963, a day after his death, his book
The Souls of Black Folk was highlighted by
Roy Wilkins at the
March on Washington, and hundreds of thousands of marchers honored him with a moment of silence. A year later, the
Civil Rights Act of 1964, embodying many of the reforms for which he had campaigned his entire life, was enacted. This
gelatin silver print of Du Bois was taken in 1907 by the American photographer
James E. Purdy, and is in the collection of the
National Portrait Gallery in Washington, D.C.
Photograph credit: James E. Purdy; restored by Adam Cuerden
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