For the football player of the same name see Walter White (football player). Walter White (born July 19, 1951 in Charlottesville, Virginia), is a former American professional football player. ...

Walter Francis White

Walter Francis White (July 1, 1893, Atlanta, Georgia - March 21, 1955, New York, New York) was a spokesman for blacks in the United States for almost a quarter of a century and executive secretary (1931-1955) of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People. After graduating from Atlanta University in 1916 (now Clark Atlanta University), in 1918 he joined the national staff of the NAACP in New York at the invitation of James Weldon Johnson. As Johnson's assistant national secretary and then as his successor at the helm of the NAACP, White waged a long and ultimately successful campaign for federal anti-lynching legislation in the United States House and Senate. White oversaw the plans and organizational structure of the fight against public segregation and was the virtual author of President Truman's presidential order desegregating the armed forces after the Second World War. He appeared white, a point he emphasized in his autobiography A Man Called White (p. 3): "I am a Negro. My skin is white, my eyes are blue, my hair is blond. The traits of my race are nowhere visible upon me."[1] Sinclair Lewis' novel, Kingsblood Royal, about a man who appears to be white but learns late in life that he is black is based in part on White's life. In fact, Lewis consulted White on the novel. [2] Image File history File links Walter_Francis_White. ... Image File history File links Walter_Francis_White. ... is the 182nd day of the year (183rd in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. ... Year 1893 (MDCCCXCIII) was a common year starting on Sunday (link will display the full calendar) of the Gregorian calendar (or a common year starting on Tuesday of the 12-day slower Julian calendar). ... Atlanta redirects here. ... is the 80th day of the year (81st in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. ... Year 1955 (MCMLV) was a common year starting on Saturday (link displays the 1955 Gregorian calendar). ... Midtown Manhattan, looking north from the Empire State Building, 2005 New York City (officially named the City of New York) is the most populous city in the state of New York and the entire United States. ... Year 1931 (MCMXXXI) was a common year starting on Thursday (link will display full 1931 calendar) of the Gregorian calendar. ... Year 1955 (MCMLV) was a common year starting on Saturday (link displays the 1955 Gregorian calendar). ... The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP, generally pronounced as EN Double AY SEE PEE) is one of the oldest and most influential civil rights organizations in the United States. ... Clark Atlanta University (CAU) is a private institution of higher education in Atlanta, Georgia. ... Sinclair Lewis Sinclair Lewis (February 7, 1885 — January 10, 1951) was an American novelist and playwright. ...

During the Joseph McCarthy era of political repression and persecution, White did not wish to criticize McCarthy’s demagogic ways, believing that the inevitable backlash would cost the NAACP their tax-exempt status and lead to equating Civil Rights with Soviet Communism.[3] [4] This article is about the U.S. senator from Wisconsin (1947-1957). ... A 1947 comic book published by the Catechetical Guild Educational Society warning of the dangers of a Communist takeover. ...

White was, in addition to his NAACP work, a journalist, novelist, and essayist. Through his cultural interests and his close friendships with white literary power brokers Carl Van Vechten and Alfred A. Knopf, White was one of the founding personalities of the "New Negro" cultural flowering, more popularly known as the "Harlem Renaissance." He married Gladys Powell in 1922, divorcing her in 1949. They had two children, actress Jane White and Walter Carl Darrow White. White married a white magazine editor, Poppy Cannon, with whom he lived until his death in 1955. For twenty-five years he had been the most influential African American in public affairs. Poppy Cannon (August 2, 1905 - April 1975) was at various times the food editor of the Ladies Home Journal and House Beautiful, and the author of several 1950s cookbooks. ...

Investigating the Elaine Race Riot

White faced Southern justice first-hand in October, 1919, when the NAACP sent him to investigate the violence known as the Elaine Race Riot in Phillips County, Arkansas. More than two hundred African American sharecroppers were killed by marauding white vigilantes and federal troops after a shootout in an attack on a church where the farmers were meeting left a white man dead. The U.S. Southern states or the South, also known colloquially as Dixie, constitute a distinctive region covering a large portion of the United States, with its own unique heritage, historical perspective, customs, musical styles, and cuisine. ... The Elaine Race Riot was a deadly 1919 race riot in the town of Elaine in Phillips County, Arkansas which gained international attention and spurred a major U.S. Supreme Court ruling. ... Phillips County is a county located in the U.S. state of Arkansas. ...

White, who was of mixed race (five of his great-great-great-grandparents were black and the other 27 were white) and was blonde and blue-eyed and able to pass for white, was granted credentials from the Chicago Daily News. That enabled him to obtain an interview with Governor Charles Hillman Brough, who in turn gave him a letter of recommendation and his autographed photograph. Portrait of Grey Owl in 1936. ... The Chicago Daily News was an afternoon daily newspaper based in Chicago, Illinois, and published between 1876 and 1978. ... Charles Hillman Brough (9 July 1876–26 December 1935) was the Democratic governor of the U.S. state of Arkansas from 1917 to 1921. ...

White was only in Phillips County for a brief time before his identity was discovered; he took the first train back to Little Rock. The conductor told him that he was leaving "just when the fun is going to start", because they had found out that there was a "damned yellow nigger passing for white and the boys are going to get him". Asked what they would do to him, the conductor told White that "when they get through with him he won't pass for white no more!" There is also a Littlerock, California. ... Wentworth Miller, multiracial but dominantly white High yellow is a term for very light-skinned African-Americans. ... The word nigger is a highly controversial term used in many English-speaking countries, including the United States, Canada, Britain, and Australia to refer to individuals with dark skin, especially those of African descent who previously were racially classified by the now outdated term Negro. ...

White published his findings in the Daily News, the Chicago Defender and The Nation, as well as the NAACP's own magazine Crisis. Governor Brough asked the United States Postal Service to prohibit the mailing of the Chicago Defender and Crisis while others attempted to enjoin distribution of the Defender at the local level. The Chicago Defender announces President Harry S. Trumans order in 1948 desegregating the United States Armed Forces. ... The Nation logo The Nation is a weekly left-liberal periodical devoted to politics and culture. ... The Crisis is the official magazine of the NAACP, and was founded by W.E.B. DuBois in 1910. ... USPS and Usps redirect here. ... Look up Injunction in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. ...

Author of Fire in the Flint (1924), Flight (1926), Rope and Faggot (1929), A Rising Wind (1945), A Man Called White (1948), and How Far the Promised Land (1955). White left unfinished Blackjack, a novel on Harlem life and the career of an African American boxer.

External links

• African American World

Further reading

• Cortner, Richard, A Mob Intent On Death, ISBN 0-8195-5161-9
• Kluger, Richard Simple Justice, ISBN 0-394-72255-8.