Civil Rights Activist, National Association for the Advancement
of Colored People Founding Member An outstanding critic, editor,
scholar, author, and civil rights leader, W. E. B. Du Bois is
certainly among the most influential blacks of the twentieth
century. Born in Great Barrington, Massachusetts on February 23,
1868, Du Bois received a bachelor's degree from Fisk University
and went on to earn a second bachelor's, as well as a Ph.D.,
from Harvard. He was for a time professor of Latin and Greek at
Wilberforce and the University of Pennsylvania, and also served
as a professor of economics and history at Atlanta University.
One of the founders of the National Association for the
Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) in 1909, Du Bois served as
that organization's director of publications and editor of
Crisis magazine until 1934. In 1944, he returned from Atlanta
University to become head of the NAACP's special research
department, a post he held until 1948. Dr. Du Bois emigrated
from the United States to Afri