The Colored Boy [wrapper title]

[N.p., likely Portsmouth, Va, 1929. [5],25pp. Original pictorial wrappers with photographic portrait of the author as a young man on front wrapper, stapled. Substantial toning and some dust-soiling and pencil math markings to wrappers, moderate chip to bottom corner of rear wrapper. Internally quite clean. Overall about very good. An exceedingly rare work of African American uplift published at the outset of the Great Depression by a notable Virginia preacher. Dr. C.C. Somerville was an active and in-demand traveling preacher based in Portsmouth, Virginia. However, according to contemporary newspaper records, Somerville preached up and down the eastern seaboard from North Carolina to Connecticut in the 1920s and '30s. In his "Publisher's Note" in the present pamphlet, Somerville indicates the work is the "third edition of this brochure," but such a claim might be hyperbole. The work opens with a small contemporary portrait of the author, followed by his note, then a dedication, two pages of testimonials, and then the main text of the work. Somerville dedicates the work "for hope and inspiration of the coloored youth who erstwhile has been held down with many a handicap, but who has the right and ability to rise when shown the way, and who will some day come into his own." The testimonials come from four pastors from Virginia, New Jersey, North Carolina, and Massachusetts, plus the newspaper office of the Newark Herald. One pastor commends it "to anyone who is interested in the race uplift."

The main text begins with a musing on the "circumstances" of "the colored boy" in history, that "he is born in and surrounded with poverty...sees much to discourage and very little to encourage" and so forth. "But," says Somerville, "the youth must take for his cue that the things worth having must be won by effort and that much of the opposition he meets must be made stepping stones by which he must rise." Somerville's text continues in much the same vein, with sections titled, "Use to Which He Should Apply His Talents," ","What Have We A Right to Expectof Him?," and "Some Specimens," being a series of short biographical notes on various African American figures of the day. Towards the end of the work, Somerville includes as an Addenda the text of a report from the Commission on Interracial Co-operation titled, "America's Obligation to the Negro" which includes sections on "Popular Fallacies About Race Relations" and"What Does the Negro Want?" The pamphlet concludes here, with the sentence, "In short, the Negro asks no special privileges, but simply even-handed justice and a fair chance in the struggle for existence." Being a man of God, Somerville's narrative is naturally tinged with religion, but he also widens out his thoughts on the history and social situation faced by African Americans.

A very rare work. No copies are reported in OCLC, but we found two holdings through online searches, at the Maryland State Archives (also a stated "third edition") and the Atlanta University Center's Robert Woodruff Library.