Yesterday evening a special event celebrated the processing of the Theodore M. Berry Papers.  Hosted by the Office of the President, UC Libraries, UC College of Law, UC Alumni Association, and the UC Foundation, the gathering attracted over a hundred people to recognize the outstanding contributions of civil rights leader Berry to his alma mater, his community and his nation.   Theodore “Ted” Berry (1905-2000) was the first African American mayor in Cincinnati, served the Lyndon Baines Johnson presidential administration in civil rights programs, and was an active attorney for the NAACP.  The Berry papers, acquired by the UC Libraries many years ago, were able to be fully processed through a grant from the National Historical Publications and Records Commission of the National Archives.  The materials are now available for research and teaching.

Held in the Alumni Center, the celebration began with a welcome from Dean Victoria Montavon and her remarks on the grant project.  President Gregory Williams then followed with a talk on Berry’s public service and the significance of the celebration for Black History Month.   Berry’s children – Faith Berry, Gail Berry West, and the Hon. Theodore N. Berry – gave eloquent and emotional tributes to their father.  A demonstration of the finding aid for the Berry collection concluded the program.

It was a wonderful evening, made possible by the contributions of so many people.  It truly does take a village of librarians, campus, and community leaders to guide such an important project to fulfillment: Victoria Montavon and Steve Marine for supporting and shepherding the grant; Jen Burke for fiscal assistance; Suzanne Maggard and Janice Schulz of the Archives & Rare Books Library who worked on the finding aid and website; and especially Laura Laugle, the project archivist who processed the papers and designed the web exhibit.  It was Laura’s frequent blogs about the Berry project that created so much awareness not only of the contents of the collection, but the passion and accomplishments of Berry as well.

Arranging the event to welcome the Berry family and the public was no small task either.  Melissa Norris prepared exhibit photos and the program to make sure everything was inviting and informative, and along with Joanne Mayfield-Williams set everything in motion for the evening; Greg Vehr, who arranged for proclamations of “Theodore Berry Day” from Cincinnati mayor Mark Mallory and Ohio governor John Kasich; Danute Miskinis of the UC Foundation, Myron Hughes of the Alumni Association; Karen Sieber of the College of Law, and Marianne Kunnen-Jones of the Office of the President helped create the entire event, and Dean Louis Bilionis of the College of Law contributed his support as well.

To learn more about the Theodore M. Berry Papers and the project that processed them for use, please see http://www.libraries.uc.edu/libraries/arb/exhibits/berry/index.html or contact the Archives & Rare Books Library, 513.556.1959 or archives@ucmail.uc.edu.  The Berry collection is a dynamic one as more materials will be accessioned as time goes by, photo exhibits will be mounted on the website, and informative blogs will continue to be posted.

It’s been just over a year since I began working with the Theodore M. Berry papers and in that time this collection has become a part of me in a way I never guessed it would. I have learned about 20th century American history and the black experience in a way that no history book or classroom setting could ever duplicate; I have gotten an insider’s look at the US government during the civil rights movement; and I have come to know a man whom I never had the opportunity to meet but whom I greatly admire. This will be my last blog post for this project and, though I am sad to be leaving, I know that this collection will always be with me in its contribution to my education and understanding of the world.

Today would have been Theodore M. Berry’s 106th birthday and thanks to his family and UC President Gregory Williams, we have an additional reason to celebrate his life. Dr. Williams nominated Berry for induction to the Ohio Civil Rights Hall of Fame earlier this year and on October 13, 2011 he was officially inducted at a ceremony at the Ohio State Courthouse. At the ceremony Judge Ted N. Berry spoke on behalf of his father and the rest of the Berry family. In his speech he mentioned some of the countless contributions his father made to the lives of minorities and the underprivileged in Ohio  - those deeds which will forever be remembered as having changed the course of history. But more potently, Ted spoke passionately of his father’s attitude and of the philosophy which drove those deeds. “Plead the cause of the poor and the needy” he would say. And that is his legacy.

Happy birthday Mayor Berry!

In 2010, the University of Cincinnati Libraries received a $61,287 grant from the National Historical Publications and Records Commission of the Archives and Records Administration to fully process the Theodore M. Berry Collection in the Archives & Rare Books Library.  All information and opinions published on the Berry project website and in the blog entries are those of the individuals involved in the grant project and do not reflect those of the National Archives and Records Administration.  We gratefully acknowledge the support of NARA.

By Laura Laugle

For many people familiar with the American Civil Rights Movement, the recent death of Fred Shuttlesworth marks the end of an era. Shuttlesworth was the last surviving member of “The Big Three” a descriptor for the three founding members of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Rev. Ralph Abernathy and Rev. Fred Shuttlesworth.

Though Shuttlesworth is predominately known for his work in Birmingham, Alabama, he actually lived much of his life right here in Cincinnati. He moved here in 1961 to take a position as pastor at Revelation Baptist Church and met the Berry family when he moved into their former home on North Crescent Ave. Although he continued his involvement in the Civil Rights Movement mostly through his work with the Southern Christian Leadership Conference in Alabama, he did have a few special projects going in the which city he called home until his retirement in 2007 which would have been important to Ted Berry, particularly later in their careers.

As has been gone over in this blog, Berry was a great motivator of the fair housing movement in the city of Cincinnati, and in 1988 Fred Shuttlesworth also joined the cause with the founding of the Shuttlesworth Housing Foundation. Perhaps more importantly, however, was their mutual fight against Cincinnati’s 9-X electoral system, which they both felt diluted the minority vote unfairly and caused a lack of minority representation on Cincinnati City Council as a result. In 1992, Shuttlesworth was a named plaintiff in Clarke v. City of Cincinnati, a suit which sought to get rid of the system all together. The plaintiffs’ case depended largely on historical data from around the time that 9-X was originally implemented in 1957, and compared that to data from previous elections which utilized a Proportional Representation system.

For a first hand account of what happened when 9X was implemented, the plaintiffs turned to Theodore Berry, who was ousted from his seat on council for the first time in eight years in the following election. He had always maintained that the GOP campaigns against proportional representation from the 1930s through the actual implementation of 9X in 1957 were essentially attempting to keep minorities off city council. Shuttlesworth agreed, and they presented evidence in court in an attempt to have 9X discarded.

However, they didn’t agree on the election system which would replace 9X, should it be defeated in court. Shuttlesworth and his fellow members of the Black Taxpayers Association felt that a districting system was the best option and that PR, while more fair than 9X, was still an at-large system which would require candidates to raise enough money to campaign city wide and would therefore make representation of the poor nearly impossible. Berry, then a member of Citizens for Proportional Representation, took issue with a districting system because he felt that it would further segregate the city, black district v. white district, and because he feared future redrawing of districts which could again dilute the vote of the poor and minorities. Their disagreement here was moot, however, since the federal court judge upheld 9X as compliant with the Voting Rights Act of 1965.

Dispite this defeat, both Berry and Shuttlesworth made great strides in the march towards equality both here in Cincinnati and in the rest of the United States, and continued to be honored for their work and sacrifices.

In 2010, the University of Cincinnati Libraries received a $61,287 grant from the National Historical Publications and Records Commission of the Archives and Records Administration to fully process the Theodore M. Berry Collection in the Archives & Rare Books Library.  All information and opinions published on the Berry project website and in the blog entries are those of the individuals involved in the grant project and do not reflect those of the National Archives and Records Administration.  We gratefully acknowledge the support of NARA.

By Laura Laugle

Now that the physical processing of the Berry collection is complete and I’ve begun arranging materials, I’ve come across some items which, when I processed them months and months ago, I was too ignorant of their context to fully appreciate. Chief among those items are three copies of The New Horizon. I had no idea when I pulled out the rusty staples, pried off the bits of rapidly disintegrating paperclips and filed them temporarily (read: labeled with a removable sticky note) as “Misc. Copies of New Horizon” how incredibly important these school papers really are.

I’ve briefly written about The New Horizon in another blog post entitled Civil Rights in Ohio but for those who may not know, The New Horizon was a student magazine produced for and by the African American students of the University of Cincinnati beginning in the late 1920s. But you might ask why I am so thrilled to have found three additional copies. The answer is simple – this quadruples the number of previously held issues to four. Just like African American fraternities and sororities, other African American clubs and publications were ignored by the University administration, a situation which was described in the June 1928 “The Negro here has never before held a particular position of importance, he has never taken part in any extra-curricular activities – hence why should he – there is no place for him.” The result is that related materials simply weren’t preserved as they should have been making these paper a rarity. A bonus to finding issues of this particular publication is that The New Horizon had a policy of “openness” and accepted all types of submissions so each issue is a mix of university news, book and play reviews, histories, poems and essays with a focus on black life in Cincinnati.  Now, researchers can use these wonderful resources to get a much clearer look into how black students of the University of Cincinnati lived during that time and how their circumstances affected their lives on and off campus.

In the May 1928 issue the editor marked in Editor Theodore M. Berry’s handwriting as “my first journalistic effort,” the paper discusses its purpose.

“Within the last few years the number of Negro students attending the day session of the University has increased from a mere handful to forty-five. Forty five students eagerly seeking the knowledge and training offer by the various courses and types of work of this institution. But mere academic work is not the sole interest of college students. Hence this group of students isolated by prejudices, yet to be overcome, has decided to unite in an effort to supply for itself some of the extra curricula activities which broaden human life.”

Later in his career Berry submitted an excerpt of the following essay (marked in brackets) as part of a list of quotations representing him and his career:

In 2010, the University of Cincinnati Libraries received a $61,287 grant from the National Historical Publications and Records Commission of the Archives and Records Administration to fully process the Theodore M. Berry Collection in the Archives & Rare Books Library.  All information and opinions published on the Berry project website and in the blog entries are those of the individuals involved in the grant project and do not reflect those of the National Archives and Records Administration.  We gratefully acknowledge the support of NARA.

A total of 223 boxes of the Theodore M. Berry Manuscript Collection have now been processed, leaving just six remaining.  In the final collection there will be approximately 180 linear feet with around 475,000 total documents and about 1,000 photographs dating from the 1910s though 2000. The inventory in progress includes a detailed list of the titles and contents of folders, along with series and sub-series for the boxes in which each of the folders is stored. This list will be used for a final Encoded Archival Description finding aid that will be available on OhioLINK and the Internet for researchers using the collection.  The completion date for the project is set for February 2012.

In 2010, the University of Cincinnati Libraries received a $61,287 grant from the National Historical Publications and Records Commission of the Archives and Records Administration to fully process the Theodore M. Berry Collection in the Archives & Rare Books Library.  All information and opinions published on the Berry project website and in the blog entries are those of the individuals involved in the grant project and do not reflect those of the National Archives and Records Administration.  We gratefully acknowledge the support of NARA.