49. Richard Wright to John Davis, 1 March 1958, 17.36, AMSAC Papers, Moorland-Spingarn Center.
50. Richard Wright to John Davis, 11 May 1959, 17.36, AMSAC Papers, Moorland-Spingarn Center.
51. Ibid.
52. John Davis to Richard Wright, 23 May 1959, 93.1173, Wright Papers.
53. Quoted in Fabre,
54. Quoted in Rowley,
55. “AMSAC: Its Purpose, Program, and Activities,” n.d., 1.2, AMSAC Papers, Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, New York Public Library.
56. “Summary Report, Second Annual Conference,” June 1959, 1.4, AMSAC Papers, Schomburg Center; Yvonne O. Walker, telephone interview with author, 9
May 2006.
57. “AMSAC: Its Purpose, Program, and Activities.”
58. These volumes included the proceedings of the 1960 and 1963 conferences, entitled
The 1963 event, held at Howard University, featured, among other southern African independence leaders, Oliver Tambo of the African National Congress.
For the conference program, see AMSAC Newsletter (Extra Conference Issue), 15 March 1963, 1.12, AMSAC Papers, Schomburg Center.
59. Program, “Fifth Annual Holiday Party,” 1961, 1.4, AMSAC Papers, Schomburg Center.
60. Walker interview; John Davis to Martin Kilson, 25 April 1962, 6.2, AMSAC
Papers, Moorland-Spingarn Center.
61. “U.S. Culture Society Opens Office in Africa,”
N O T E S T O PA G E S 2 1 0 – 2 1 3
305
62. AMSAC Newsletter, January–February 1961, 49.9, St. Clair Drake Papers, Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, New York Public Library.
63. Alioune Diop to John Davis, 4 December 1961, 6.2, AMSAC Papers, Moorland-Spingarn Center.
64. Minutes of Postponed Annual Meeting of Directors, AMSAC, 2 July 1962, 31.86C, Bond Papers; John Davis to AMSAC Board, 14 November 1961, 13.26, AMSAC Papers, Moorland-Spingarn Center; AMSAC Executive Council minutes, 29–30 June 1962, 49.9, Drake Papers.
65. John Davis to Alioune Diop, 14 August 1962, 49.9, Drake Papers.
66. Alioune Diop to John Davis, 4 December 1961, 6.2, AMSAC Papers, Moorland-Spingarn Center.
67. Adelaide Cromwell Hill to John Davis, 19 December 1961, 6.2, AMSAC Papers, Moorland-Spingarn Center.
68. Martin Kilson to John Davis, 10 April 1962, 6.2, AMSAC Papers, Moorland-Spingarn Center.
69. Alioune Diop to John Davis, 4 December 1961, 6.2, AMSAC Papers, Moorland-Spingarn Center; John Davis to Martin Kilson, 25 April 1962, 6.2, AMSAC Papers, Moorland-Spingarn Center. The attitude of young Africans at Harvard toward AMSAC, as described by Kilson, is echoed in the account by Nigerian poet and playwright John Pepper Clark of his sojourn at Princeton on a Parvin Fellowship in 1962. According to Clark, the “social climbing and status-seeking”
black Americans who belonged to AMSAC made “a profession of their identity, and indeed a booming business of it.” J. P. Clark,
70. “Report on the Special Meeting Called by AMSAC,” 27 May 1961, 49.10, Drake Papers.
71. Summary minutes, Business Meeting, 29 June 1959, 49.22, Drake Papers.
72. Minutes of Postponed Annual Meeting of Directors, CORAC, 10 March 1959, 37.113A, Bond Papers.
73. Matthew McCloskey to John Davis, 29 April 1959, 30.80B, Bond Papers; minutes of First Meeting of Directors, AMSAC, 22 June 1960, 31.82C, Bond Papers.
74. In 1962, AMSAC transferred its account to the Chase Manhattan bank in order to facilitate money transfers to Lagos. Yvonne Walker to Horace Mann Bond, 27
September 1962, 8.41, AMSAC Papers, Moorland-Spingarn Center.
75. James Baker to Frederick Van Vechten, 30 November 1962, 8.35, AMSAC Papers, Moorland-Spingarn Center.
76. AMSAC Budget, 1 June 1964–31 May 1965, 8.34, AMSAC Papers, Moorland-Spingarn Center. It is possible, indeed likely, that AMSAC’s published budgets did not record all of the covert funds reaching the organization.
77. In 1964, for example, Webster asked “what was being done to spread the word of
306
N O T E S T O PA G E S 2 1 3 – 2 1 6
AMSAC’s work among other agencies in the field: he said he had recently seen a Ford Foundation paper which did not even mention AMSAC.” Minutes of Postponed Annual Meeting of Directors, AMSAC, 15 October 1964, 37.113B, Bond Papers.
78. Financial Statement, 1 June 1962–31 May 1963, 6.8, AMSAC Papers, Moorland-Spingarn Center. These changes in AMSAC’s funding should be viewed in the context of a general increase in CIA covert operations in Africa in the early 1960s, as the rate of European decolonization speeded up. According to one estimate, between 1959 and 1963 Agency activity on the continent grew by 54 percent. Kevin A. O’Brien, “Interfering with Civil Society: CIA and KGB Covert Political
Action
during
the
Cold
War,”