Are at the world famous Schomburg Center for research in black culture. Why is the world famous . Because it is the most important repository to study black history founded 90 years ago. And who is pearl . He is the founding cureateer. He migrated from puerto rico and found a job on wall street working in a mail room. He worked hard and brought any rare or unique books you could find that were by or about black people eventually becoming famous for this collection. People would go to his home in brooklyn to see the library, borrow from the library, people like langston hues and hurston eventually. It arrived 90 years ago and made up the core of what is a 10 million item collection at the Schomburg Center for research in black culture. How did it end up at this location . Because this was the settlement zone, ground zero, for what came to be the negro mecca of the world. Harlem usa four blocks over. Most people today think about harlem in relation to the apollo or the baptist church. 125th street is the commercial corridor of harlem and the publ public imagination but the first that settled settled on 130th street between lynnx avenue better known as malcom x boulevard and adam clapper boulevard. It was that one block that received the first black families and property owners. It is why the first colored ymca is across the street. It is why harlem hospital, which wasnt for black patients in its founding, became the main center for training black nurses and doctors and taking black patients. This was the home of black harlem. What is the Schomburg Center for research in black culture relationship with harlem it is the archive of the place of telling the stories. The history makers and change agents from Langston Hughes and malcolm x. This is the place that those people walked through these doors in search of information, fellowship, and camaraderie and walked out smarter, more committed, and more passionate to tell the stories and do the work. What is the relationship with the Ny Public Library . New york Public Library owns and operates the facility. The new york Public Library was the broker of the deal that helped to bring the collection here along with the Carnegie Museum and the National Urban league. The library was committed to serving the patrons of this community by finding this selection and for these past 90 years the new york Public Library supported the operation of this center as it does other Research Centers associated with it. 10 million pieces. What is in that 10 million . A lot of papers and books. We have about 400,000 volumes in terms of books. Those books represent our purchases over those 90 years including many original collections. We have a very substantial ma e manuscript collection. It is those individual pieces of paper, the correspondence, the diary entries and unpublished m manuscripts. We have negatives, prints, born digital photo graphic material. We have a collection that represents original jazz albums, unpublished material, including moving images, going back to the 1960s and 70s when a lot of documentary films were made. And we have an Art Collection that rivals with the best Art Collection existing in this country. We have, argue this and no one has taken issue, the best collection of 20th century africanamerican fine arts. The collection is vast in its range and significant in what it represents for telling africanAmerican History and global history. Available to the public . Yes, yes. We are committed in the new york Library Public system for every item i just described being able to any research, or individual, self described expert, young adult to seasoned experienced mentor of this community, can come in and ask to see original material and have that material delivered to them so they might use it for themselves. The library received 60 of support from the city and there is an endowment that helps fund the overall operation of the libra library. Six percent of the money comes from new york and 40 from endowment and restricted funds and grants we are awarded in the course of fundraising. When you see your role . My role is set to division and direction of this institution and manage the leadership of these institutions. No more than 300,000 come through the door. My job is to make sure this place runs smoothly, that we are responsive to community needs, i focus on addressing issues short term and long term. I am a booster and advocate for the importance of institutions like this. They are committed to education in the general sense. Particularly one that expands our public fear that helps people fute a pabb feel a par our democracy and be engaged. I represent the institution externally. How did you get here . I was a history professor at Indiana University for six years prior to coming here. I caught us history with a specialization in racial relations in africanAmerican History. The particular circumstances of my arrival went along with the departure of my successor and the Search Committee looking to reboot generationally. You have been here five years. What significant things would you like to see happen or have happened . So this is the start of my fifth year. I would say that we have worked very hard to make the Schomburg Center for research in black Culture Center as relevant today as it was in the 60s and 70s. Young culture producers and artist and activist i have already named. We focused a lot on our programs and bringing in different talents that really speak to those younger audiences. By that i mean in a setting we are talking about people from 2545 years old. As a result of some clever social media marketing, bringing new talent, we have seen as i mention, the numbers triple to over 300,000 which is a big deal. There is a saturday program that is focused on college prep and we view the collection to work with middle and High School Students to increase their critical reading and oral and analytical skills. And then we expose them to ways to communicate and express themselves from spoken word journalism, and scholarships. I focused on taking that program and securing its finances and making it a model for other organizations around the country. We have a lot of s. T. E. M. Science, technology, and mathematics. But very little on history. For programs such as history tv, history is a big part of the nonfiction world and what we see is lacking in the overall poplar culture. You have been quoted as saying i want to be the google of historic literature. We want to be a resource in a way that bridges a millennial sense when it comes to technology and the speed and access of information with substance and rich engagement. So google is the portal to a universe of information and we want to be on the back side of that universe to provide Quality Content and to be a source of inspiration for further learning. The last thing we want is for people to have experiences in real time or virturely turning them off to the ideas of scholarship that we focus on. Where did you grow up . South side of chicago. Where did you go to school . King wood academy. Public school. Three quarters of a mile from where the president and first lady call home. College . The university of pennsylvania. I studied economics. And decided late in my tenure there i was going to be a public accountant. So i made a mad grab for accounting classes so i could sit for the exam and graduated with a degree in economics. And started working as an accountant. How did you get from there to history professor at ieu . College is a fascinating journey. The best of college is an opportunity to expose one to various endeavors of human kind. So for me all of the kind of liberal arts that where was exposed to in english and history classes and africanamerican studies, none of which were my major, turned out to be the most interesting to me once i got out of college. I decided if i was going to be as smart as i needed to be as an account n meaning gap or the v governing accounting principals and if i were to be that smart in accounting i would rather be that smart in africanamerican histories. Something that is important to me and a budding passion. Blip blip. Or the founding of the nation are the concept of freedom or the debate without putting black people at the center of that story. Host this is a petition from you could explain in further something broke with the purveyors of the cultural knowledge between the 20s and the 30s the parents my parents generation decided it wanted their kids to go to wall street to be lawyers and to assimilate into american institutions that were not compatible with the Old School Approach they did it with the best of intentions the subsidy had the opportunities of the 1980s that is an interesting quotation. That is we . [laughter] host are you surprised . Guest not really. So a the black experience has always bad one of being whole from the margins. After the 60s moved the margins to the center conceptually and then that shift with the burgeoning black middle class if they felt that worked to reconcile the possibility of the American Dream when that the legal and the structure was no longer a barrier that sense of skepticism against the reality that people experience. So my generation was not handed the what was always part of the sharecropper a abbess glaves sensibility. The slave sensibility that they had an obligation to make sure the country would live up to its responsibilities so my generation is we were thrown into the world that there was nothing wrong with the world. This was a world for me by the time i was in college trying to understand that would be the focus of the major urban uprising that prevented the tip of the iceberg the was ballooning on the unprecedented scale. Of 1991 and 92 talking about incarceration today but my parents did not prepare us for the work that needs to happen today. That is the critique we were making about trading on success. Host who are your parents . They are both retired professionals one was a schoolteacher and administrative 45 years and my father recently retired was of photojournalist. On the eve of the past 20 years is that the New York Times. Host are they retired in new york . My parents divorced when i was young my mother is in chicago my father lived in new york over 20 years. Host your the the itch . The part that i know is i of the great grandson of a the father of his long. Might bother was educated at the university of is long before he went to college and my mother never converted. Theyre all very much part of his family part of the grandfather and father legacy and i was very much a part of that as a child. That was a formative that any child that is part of a family that means something you recognized early that people see you differently. So i had conversations with adults because i was the grandson of malaysia muhamed out of sheer curiosity in the typical way celebrity culture attaches to people. And i had some sensibilities that were cultivated as a result coming from a family with this background. What may be counter intuitive is i was not anything special with regard to the nature of islam than any other member at the time of was not groomed to be a successor in fact, my great uncle started another movement that was very controversial but he embodied the of one generation removed that it did not trickledown to my generation. So the analogy is the preachers kids are often times raising the most tell in church as opposed to following in the footsteps. So what is his role at the center . He is a major part of our commitment to celebrating the contributions of africanamericans the latter have articulated in courageous terms, the black experience. His collection is one of the most significant. And annually we have programming to commemorate his birth and assassination. These are usually focused within muslim communities both foreignborn immigrant and american because we look to the legacy of malcolm x to help understand the world that help them understand lebanon and cairo to look at his world perspective at the time. Host the Schomburg Center also said hosts. Yes. Leer the bed you within 50 years the home of a the harlem book fair and we have had wonderful programs on cspan for authors and famous people. Host Khalil Gibran muhammad in a lot of the interviews you have done you talk about education another petition from view, the only way to get a coherent message is to trade everybody on that, based of readings and understanding what the problem is so everybody understands that kind of message. Day river saying that . I dont. I am curious because it is probably in a specific context. If i talk about young people that is what we do with the Junior Scholars Program we will reach a common text in the years passed weve read the autobiography of malcolm x, narratives coverage jobless graphic novel from john lewis. So depending on the context the same way that Colombia University does the core curriculum with great works of literature or history that you have a base of knowledge. You were to build a core curriculum what would be in it . To be as fluent in this context. I have a history booster so i think it is critical that people understand the passed away that professional historians articulate that. So over popular or Public Discourse to publish history books i dont count those with the core curriculum of what i talk about but called american slavery American Freedom that is the conundrum that it was aberrational to the american project as they parted professor describes as many historians would now agree is essential to the project of deciding what slavery and freedom were and should be the limit of democracy that is still a work in progress. But James Baldwin is a terrific writer to have a special connection and a major the fire inside was read the next time the declaration of independence because no work of literature in the u. S. Context no work of history with those core ideals are ticketed by the founding fathers. Peter you are stretching the limits of my curriculum development. But that is paid good. Could they come into the Schomburg Center to see personal papers . We are considered the home of maya angelou of collection currently only have correspondence between him and his brother it is in possession of the state one day we hope to get it but even in the collection of correspondence with the James Baldwin is important to scholarship. You are also an author . Yes. We already published book is called of condemnation of blackness. Host you have been working on the second for quite awhile. I have the administrative and fundraising responsibilities but it is difficult i have published an article from it is called disappearing act the end of white criminality in the age of jim crow. Host are you surprised over the past year with Race Relations . Yes. I am. From a the way in which there have been shootings of on armed people that seem to come one after the other. These are not new phenomenon obviously the you would they inclinations saturated with media era and commentary that there be Behavioral Changes so what happens in Staten Island might have limited the possibility that shots were in his back in Charleston South Carolina but it seems the circumstances of freddie grey from a few weeks ago i am surprised the highprofile nature of these moments seem not to have had any effect on changing Police Behavior to the point that people are frustrated and more focused on changing the system than i have ever seen in my lifetime as an adult. Host put into Historical Perspective is this a typical year . Yes. It has been typical the most significant measure is the involvement and investment of the department of justice responding immediately to episodes of Controversial Police shootings. So what sparked this moment with the ferguson investigation that rolls and into the Philadelphia Department of justice investigation and the most recent reporting on the of cleveland doj it has also fallen on new work Police Department in the last 12 months. We have not see this kind of engagement with local policing matters since the civil rights movement. Host would this have happened without a black attorney general or black president . We will leave that up to the historians i will shy away from the counterfactual. One could argue that it is more important there is the democrat and republican given the way the Republican Party has treated matters of criminal justice and tell quite recently with the bipartisan never led in georgia or by a the pope brothers. The koch brothers. But eric holder matters more to the commitment and willingness to use doj for local policing matters they and the presence of a black man and though white house or president obama in particular. Host we are city in your opposition notice of book on your desk. I will ask you about the title. [laughter] the loneliness of the black republican. A new professor at the Harvard Kennedy school is terrific and i have started to read it. It is representative of a new field of scholarship of political history that tries to unpack the origins of the new right starting in the 70s and other great authors wrote about it. This is very recent modern u. S. History with those that were appointed by the republicans or republican