Cover image, Signature 1968

From Jonathan Bloy, Librarian - Head of Digital Initiatives

We recently scanned and added the 1968 edition of The Signature to our digital collection of Edgewood Creative Arts Journals. This edition of The Signature was published during the heart of the civil rights movement, and shortly after the assassination of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr..

Two essays included in the publication (written by African American students at Edgewood) are particularly poignant to today's racial troubles.  How relevant these two essays are, 52 years after they were written, motivates us to work even harder to do help dismantle systemic racism.  We hope you will join us in that effort.

From Because I'm Black by Ann Blackmon:

Because I'm black, I have so many worries for a person so young. I have to worry about every aspect of America's race problem. I worry about everything that concerns and affects my people--the blacks of America, I worry about poverty, housings, education and riots. With these worries already, you'd think I'd have no more. Well at every juncture of the days I worry about me. I worry and question myself. I worry about my being here at Edgewood. I'm in the minority here, so I feel ill at ease at times, To remedy this I tell myself (like every black student on the white campus), "I'm here, I'm black and I'm beautiful." I know that I've two strikes against me already--my black skin and the pressure of having to prove myself because I am a Negro and this drives me.

From What Now by Katie Lowe:

Was it necessary for black people to turn to violence before you could hear the agonizing cry of this sick society? Must we let you completely destroy us before you permit change? Are you willing to exert a greater effort toward racial justice and brotherhood? Do you know why the black people are burning in Chicago and other cities? Can you answer these questions with a clear head and heart? We have prayed, we have marched, we have voted and petitioned, we have been good little black boys and girls. We have shed blood in every war that you have bled in to make America a free country, only to return and be drained of every drop of decency and self pride that we had.