Charles E. Cobb Jr.
Charles E. Cobb Jr. | |
---|---|
Cobb at a talk about his book at Potters House in Washington D.C., on February 27, 2016. | |
Born | (1943-06-23) June 23, 1943 (age 80) Springfield, Massachusetts |
Occupation | journalist |
Known for | Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee |
Notable work | "This Nonviolent Stuff'll Get You Killed: How Guns Made the Civil Rights Movement Possible" |
Charles E. "Charlie" Cobb Jr. (born June 23, 1943) is a journalist, professor, and former activist with the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC). Along with several veterans of SNCC, Cobb established and operated the African-American bookstore Drum and Spear in Washington, D.C., from 1968 to 1974.[1] Currently he is a senior analyst at allAfrica.com and a visiting professor at Brown University.[2]
Biography
Cobb was born in Washington, D.C., in 1943 and grew up in Springfield, Massachusetts. His parents were politically active.[3] His great grandfather founded a farming community in Mississippi called New Africa in 1888.[4] In the fall of 1961 Cobb started studies at Howard University where he became active in the Civil Rights Movement. After following and reading about the sit-in demonstrations, Cobb participated in a protest against segregation in Annapolis, Maryland, where he was arrested in an act of civil disobedience.[5][6] In 1962 he traveled to the Mississippi Delta and became a field secretary for the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC).[7] His work and activism as SNCC field secretary lasted until 1967. He mainly worked in Washington, Issaquena, and Sunflower counties in Mississippi. While in Mississippi, Cobb wrote a proposal to SNCC to set up Freedom Schools that was submitted in December 1963.[8] Cobb wrote that Freedom Schools should be set up "to fill an intellectual and creative vacuum in the lives of young Negro Mississippians, and to get them to articulate their own desires, demands, and questions..."[9] In 1967 Cobb visited Vietnam with Julius Lester with the assistance of the Bertrand Russell War Crimes Tribunal. After returning, he and other SNCC veterans established Drum and Spear Bookstore in Washington, DC, which became for a time the largest bookstore in the country specializing in books for and about black people.[10][11] He also helped establish at this time the Center for Black Education in Washington, DC.[12] Later he traveled through parts of Africa, including Tanzania, where he lived in 1970 and 1971.
In 1974 Cobb began his career in journalism when he began reporting for WHUR Radio in Washington, DC. Later, in 1976, Cobb started work at National Public Radio as a foreign affairs reporter, working on the network's coverage of Africa. Cobb helped to establish the NPR's first coverage of African affairs. After leaving National Public Radio, Cobb worked as a correspondent for the PBS show Frontline from 1983 until 1985. In 1985 he became the first black staff writer for National Geographic Magazine. He was a member of National Geographic′s editorial staff from 1985 to 1997. Currently Cobb is a senior analyst at allAfrica.com.
Recognition
Cobb was a founding member of the National Association of Black Journalists and was inducted into their Hall of Fame in 2008.[13][14] Cobb is currently a visiting professor of Africana studies at Brown University, where he teaches a course called "The Organizing Tradition of the Southern Civil Rights Movement."[15]
Selected publications
- Radical Equations: Civil Rights from Mississippi to the Algebra Project,[16] with Bob Moses (Beacon Press, 2001), ISBN 9780807031278
- No Easy Victories: African Liberation and American Activists Over a Half Century, 1950-2000,[17] edited with William Minter and Gail Hovey (Africa World Press, 2007), ISBN 1592215750
- On the Road to Freedom: A Guided Tour of the Civil Rights Trail[18] (Algonquin Books, 2008), ISBN 1565124391
- This Nonviolent Stuff'll Get You Killed: How Guns Made the Civil Rights Movement Possible (Basic Books, 2014, Duke University Press, 2015 pb), ISBN 0465033105
References
- ^ Davis, Joshua Clark (28 January 2017). "Black-Owned Bookstores: Anchors of the Black Power Movement". Black Perspectives. Retrieved February 20, 2017.
- ^ "Charles E. Cobb". Choices Program. Retrieved 2021-08-01.
- ^ Stabile, Lori (June 22, 2013). "Fellowship Center at St. John's Congregational Church named after civil rights leader Rev. Charles Cobb". Mass Live.
- ^ Cobb, Charles (April 1999). "Traveling The Blues Highway". National Geographic. Archived from the original on February 4, 2014. Retrieved December 17, 2013.
- ^ Cobb, Charles. "CRMvet.org". Retrieved 17 December 2013.
- ^ "400 TRY NEW SIT-IN DRIVE; 15 ARRESTED". The Sun. November 19, 1961.
- ^ Cobb, Charles. "From Atlanta to East Africa". No Easy Victories. Retrieved December 17, 2013.
- ^ Payne, Charles (1995). I've Got The Light of Freedom. Berkeley and Los Angeles, CA: University of California Press. p. 302. ISBN 978-0-520-25176-2.
- ^ Cobb, Charles. "Prospectus for a Summer Freedom School Program in Mississippi".
- ^ Gilmore, Brian. "Drum & Spear Bookstore". Beltway Poetry Quarterly.
- ^ Manns, Adrienne (August 27, 1968). "Ghetto Book Shop Finds Untapped Literary Mart". The Washington Post.
- ^ Lewis, John (August 9, 1969). "Black Voices". Afro-American.
- ^ "NABJ Founders". National Association of Black Journalists.
- ^ "Past Hall Of Fame Honorees". National Association of Black Journalists.
- ^ "Charles E. Cobb Jr". Brown University. 13 March 2023.
- ^ Radical Equations at Google Books.
- ^ "No Easy Victories home page". www.noeasyvictories.org. Retrieved 2019-06-03.
- ^ "Workman Publishing". Workman Publishing. 2016-05-23. Retrieved 2019-06-03.
External links
- SNCC Digital Gateway: Charlie Cobb, Documentary website created by the SNCC Legacy Project and Duke University, telling the story of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee & grassroots organizing from the inside-out
- Gavroche Allen, "An Interview with Former Civil Rights Organizer Charles Cobb, Jr.", The Occupied Providence Journal, September 2, 2012
- "Charles Cobb, Jr.: From Atlanta to East Africa", selection from No Easy Victories
- Marking SNCC's 50th Anniversary, interview on NPR
- Collected Articles by Charles Cobb at Civil Rights Movement Archive
- Interviews with Charles Cobb at Brown University's The Choices Program Website
- Freedom Schools at the Civil Rights Movement Archive
- R. L. Nave, "Charles E. Cobb Jr." (interview), Jackson Free Press, October 15, 2013
- National Center for Civil & Human Rights Freedom Mosaic: Charles Cobb Jr.
- "Armed for Nonviolence: Guns and the Civil Rights Movement". Interview on The Kojo Nnamdi Show, May 10, 2014.
- "Geographic’s Race Problems: Omission, Mindset" in Journal-isms ®, March 17, 2018.
- v
- t
- e
(timeline)
groups
- Alabama Christian Movement for Human Rights
- Atlanta Student Movement
- Black Panther Party
- Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters
- Congress of Racial Equality (CORE)
- Committee for Freedom Now
- Committee on Appeal for Human Rights
- Council for United Civil Rights Leadership
- Council of Federated Organizations
- Dallas County Voters League
- Deacons for Defense and Justice
- Georgia Council on Human Relations
- Highlander Folk School
- Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights
- Lowndes County Freedom Organization
- Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party
- Montgomery Improvement Association
- NAACP
- Nashville Student Movement
- Nation of Islam
- Northern Student Movement
- National Council of Negro Women
- National Urban League
- Operation Breadbasket
- Regional Council of Negro Leadership
- Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC)
- Southern Regional Council
- Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC)
- The Freedom Singers
- United Auto Workers (UAW)
- Wednesdays in Mississippi
- Women's Political Council
- Ralph Abernathy
- Victoria Gray Adams
- Zev Aelony
- Mathew Ahmann
- Muhammad Ali
- William G. Anderson
- Gwendolyn Armstrong
- Arnold Aronson
- Ella Baker
- James Baldwin
- Marion Barry
- Daisy Bates
- Harry Belafonte
- James Bevel
- Claude Black
- Gloria Blackwell
- Randolph Blackwell
- Unita Blackwell
- Ezell Blair Jr.
- Joanne Bland
- Julian Bond
- Joseph E. Boone
- William Holmes Borders
- Amelia Boynton
- Bruce Boynton
- Raylawni Branch
- Stanley Branche
- Ruby Bridges
- Aurelia Browder
- H. Rap Brown
- Ralph Bunche
- Guy Carawan
- Stokely Carmichael
- Johnnie Carr
- James Chaney
- J. L. Chestnut
- Shirley Chisholm
- Colia Lafayette Clark
- Ramsey Clark
- Septima Clark
- Xernona Clayton
- Eldridge Cleaver
- Kathleen Cleaver
- Charles E. Cobb Jr.
- Annie Lee Cooper
- Dorothy Cotton
- Claudette Colvin
- Vernon Dahmer
- Jonathan Daniels
- Abraham Lincoln Davis
- Angela Davis
- Joseph DeLaine
- Dave Dennis
- Annie Devine
- Patricia Stephens Due
- Joseph Ellwanger
- Charles Evers
- Medgar Evers
- Myrlie Evers-Williams
- Chuck Fager
- James Farmer
- Walter Fauntroy
- James Forman
- Marie Foster
- Golden Frinks
- Andrew Goodman
- Robert Graetz
- Fred Gray
- Jack Greenberg
- Dick Gregory
- Lawrence Guyot
- Prathia Hall
- Fannie Lou Hamer
- Fred Hampton
- William E. Harbour
- Vincent Harding
- Dorothy Height
- Audrey Faye Hendricks
- Lola Hendricks
- Aaron Henry
- Oliver Hill
- Donald L. Hollowell
- James Hood
- Myles Horton
- Zilphia Horton
- T. R. M. Howard
- Ruby Hurley
- Cecil Ivory
- Jesse Jackson
- Jimmie Lee Jackson
- Richie Jean Jackson
- T. J. Jemison
- Esau Jenkins
- Barbara Rose Johns
- Vernon Johns
- Frank Minis Johnson
- Clarence Jones
- J. Charles Jones
- Matthew Jones
- Vernon Jordan
- Tom Kahn
- Clyde Kennard
- A. D. King
- C.B. King
- Coretta Scott King
- Martin Luther King Jr.
- Martin Luther King Sr.
- Bernard Lafayette
- James Lawson
- Bernard Lee
- Sanford R. Leigh
- Jim Letherer
- Stanley Levison
- John Lewis
- Viola Liuzzo
- Z. Alexander Looby
- Joseph Lowery
- Clara Luper
- Danny Lyon
- Malcolm X
- Mae Mallory
- Vivian Malone
- Bob Mants
- Thurgood Marshall
- Benjamin Mays
- Franklin McCain
- Charles McDew
- Ralph McGill
- Floyd McKissick
- Joseph McNeil
- James Meredith
- William Ming
- Jack Minnis
- Amzie Moore
- Cecil B. Moore
- Douglas E. Moore
- Harriette Moore
- Harry T. Moore
- Queen Mother Moore
- William Lewis Moore
- Irene Morgan
- Bob Moses
- William Moyer
- Elijah Muhammad
- Diane Nash
- Charles Neblett
- Huey P. Newton
- Edgar Nixon
- Jack O'Dell
- James Orange
- Rosa Parks
- James Peck
- Charles Person
- Homer Plessy
- Adam Clayton Powell Jr.
- Fay Bellamy Powell
- Rodney N. Powell
- Al Raby
- Lincoln Ragsdale
- A. Philip Randolph
- George Raymond
- George Raymond Jr.
- Bernice Johnson Reagon
- Cordell Reagon
- James Reeb
- Frederick D. Reese
- Walter Reuther
- Gloria Richardson
- David Richmond
- Bernice Robinson
- Jo Ann Robinson
- Angela Russell
- Bayard Rustin
- Bernie Sanders
- Michael Schwerner
- Bobby Seale
- Cleveland Sellers
- Charles Sherrod
- Alexander D. Shimkin
- Fred Shuttlesworth
- Modjeska Monteith Simkins
- Glenn E. Smiley
- A. Maceo Smith
- Kelly Miller Smith
- Mary Louise Smith
- Maxine Smith
- Ruby Doris Smith-Robinson
- Charles Kenzie Steele
- Hank Thomas
- Dorothy Tillman
- A. P. Tureaud
- Hartman Turnbow
- Albert Turner
- C. T. Vivian
- Wyatt Tee Walker
- Hollis Watkins
- Walter Francis White
- Roy Wilkins
- Hosea Williams
- Kale Williams
- Robert F. Williams
- Andrew Young
- Whitney Young
- Sammy Younge Jr.
- Bob Zellner
- James Zwerg
songs
- "Ain't Gonna Let Nobody Turn Me 'Round"
- "If You Miss Me at the Back of the Bus"
- "Kumbaya"
- "Keep Your Eyes on the Prize"
- "Oh, Freedom"
- "This Little Light of Mine"
- "We Shall Not Be Moved"
- "We Shall Overcome"
- "Woke Up This Morning (With My Mind Stayed On Freedom)"
- Jim Crow laws
- Lynching in the United States
- Plessy v. Ferguson
- Buchanan v. Warley
- Hocutt v. Wilson
- Sweatt v. Painter
- Hernandez v. Texas
- Loving v. Virginia
- African-American women in the movement
- Jews in the civil rights movement
- Fifth Circuit Four
- 16th Street Baptist Church
- Kelly Ingram Park
- A.G. Gaston Motel
- Bethel Baptist Church
- Brown Chapel
- Dexter Avenue Baptist Church
- Holt Street Baptist Church
- Edmund Pettus Bridge
- March on Washington Movement
- African-American churches attacked
- List of lynching victims in the United States
- Freedom Schools
- Freedom songs
- Spring Mobilization Committee to End the War in Vietnam
- "Beyond Vietnam: A Time to Break Silence"
- Voter Education Project
- 1960s counterculture
- African American founding fathers of the United States
- Eyes on the Prize
- In popular culture
- Birmingham Civil Rights Institute
- Birmingham Civil Rights National Monument
- Civil Rights Memorial
- Civil Rights Movement Archive
- Emmett Till and Mamie Till-Mobley National Monument
- Medgar and Myrlie Evers Home National Monument
- Freedom Rides Museum
- Freedom Riders National Monument
- King Center for Nonviolent Social Change
- Martin Luther King Jr. Day
- Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial
- Mississippi Civil Rights Museum
- National Civil Rights Museum
- National Voting Rights Museum
- St. Augustine Foot Soldiers Monument
historians