National Negro Business League

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National Negro Business League
Company typeBusiness group
Founded1900 (1900)
Founder Booker T. Washington
SuccessorNational Business League
Headquarters
Washington, D.C.
,
United States
ServicesPromote the interests of Black-owned businesses
Executive Committee of the National Negro Business League, c. 1910. NNBL founder Booker T. Washington (1856-1915) is seated, second from the left NationalNegroBusinessLeague-ExecutiveCommittee.jpg
Executive Committee of the National Negro Business League, c. 1910. NNBL founder Booker T. Washington (1856-1915) is seated, second from the left

The National Negro Business League (NNBL) was an American organization founded in Boston in 1900 by Booker T. Washington to promote the interests of African-American businesses. [1] [2] [3] The mission and main goal of the National Negro Business League was "to promote the commercial and financial development of the Negro." It was recognized as "composed of negro men and women who have achieved success along business lines". [4] It grew rapidly with 320 chapters in 1905 and more than 600 chapters in 34 states in 1915.

Contents

In 1966, the League was renamed and reincorporated in Washington D.C. as the National Business League, which remains in operation.

History

Establishment

The National Negro Business League (NNBL) was established in Boston, Massachusetts in 1900 by Booker T. Washington. The first meeting was held at the house of Samuel E. Courtney in Boston. [5] [6] The effort of the organization was supported by industrialist and philanthropist Andrew Carnegie.[ citation needed ] The organization was formally incorporated in 1901 in New York , and established 320 chapters across the United States.

The League included Negro small- business owners, doctors, farmers, other professionals, and craftsmen. Its goal was to allow business to put economic development at the forefront of getting African-American equality in the United States. Business was the main concern, but civil rights came next.

A meeting in Louisville, Kentucky, on August 18, 1909 National Negro Business League.jpg
A meeting in Louisville, Kentucky, on August 18, 1909

In 1905 the Nashville, Tennessee, chapter protested segregation in local transit with a boycott. Booker T. Washington felt that there was a need for African Americans to build an economic network and allow that to be a catalyst for change and social improvement. Also, extant press releases indicate that "the League organized the National Negro Business Service to 'help . . the Negro business men of the country solve their merchandising and advertising problems,' promoted advertising in Negro newspapers and magazines, and 'influenced . . . national advertisers to use Negro publications in reaching this importantly valuable group of people with its tremendous purchasing power.'" [7]

The organization inspired Robert R. Church Sr. to open Solvent Savings Bank in Memphis, Tennessee in 1906. [8] In 1927, the bank merged with Fraternal Savings Bank and Trust. It closed in 1929. [9]

National Negro Business League portraits (1907) National Negro Business League portraits (1907).jpg
National Negro Business League portraits (1907)

In 1907 the group's Executive Committee included J. B. Bell of Houston, Texas; 2. S. E. Courtney, M.D. of Boston, Massachusetts; W. L. Taylor of Richmond, Virginia; T. Thomas Fortune of New York City, Chairman; N. T. Velar of Brinton, Pennsylvania; J. C. Jackson of Lexington, Kentucky; M. M. Lewey of Pensacola, Florida; E. P. Booze of Colorado Springs, Colorado; S. A. Furniss M.D. of Indianapolis, Indiana; John E. Bush of Little Rock, Arkansas; and James C. Napier of Nashville, Tennessee. [10]

In May 1913, a respected Black journalist, Ralph Waldo Tyler was elected as the first National Organizer of the NNBL. Tyler's role was to travel throughout the Southern United States and document the state of negro businesses and encourage enrollment in the NNBL. [11]

After the death of Booker T. Washington in 1915, the League was headed by his successor at Tuskegee, Robert Russa Moton. Albon L. Holsey, an executive at Tuskegee, was executive secretary of the League. Other leaders in 1922–23 were John L. Webb, treasurer (succeeding Charles H. Anderson), and Charles Clinton Spaulding, head of the North Carolina Mutual Life Insurance Co. in Durham, North Carolina. [12]

Affiliations

Affiliated professional organizations included: the National Negro Bankers Association, the National Negro Press Association, the National Association of Negro Funeral Directors, the National Negro Bar Association, the National Association of Negro Insurance Men, the National Negro Retail Merchants' Association, the National Association of Negro Real Estate Dealers, and the National Negro Finance Corporation. [12]

The National Negro Bankers Association was organized at a meeting of the League in 1906 by Birmingham's William R. Pettiford. [13]

Notable members

Executive committee

Members and people associated

See also

Footnotes

  1. ↑ Bean, Dalea (2009). "National Negro Business League". In Finkelman, Paul (ed.). Encyclopedia of African American History, 1896 to the Present: from the Age of Segregation to the Twenty-first Century. Oxford University Press. p. 451. ISBN   978-0-19-516779-5. OCLC   312624445.
  2. ↑ Bean, Dalea (February 9, 2009). "National Negro Business League". African American Studies Center (Report). Oxford African American Studies Center. doi:10.1093/acref/9780195301731.013.45975. ISBN   978-0-19-530173-1.
  3. ↑ Regev, Ronny (2023). "The National Negro Business League and the Economic Life of Black Entrepreneurs" . Past & Present (262): 207–241. doi:10.1093/pastj/gtad005. ISSN   0031-2746.
  4. ↑ "Calendar". The Independent. July 13, 1914. Retrieved August 5, 2012.
  5. ↑ "Courtney, Samuel E.". Who's Who in Colored America. Who's Who in Colored America Corporation. 1927. pp. 238–239.
  6. ↑ Staples, Cynthia (July 9, 2024). "From the Historian: Samuel E. Courtney". Trinity Church. Archived from the original on July 19, 2025. Retrieved September 11, 2025.
  7. ↑ "National Negro Business League". Library of Congress. Retrieved January 26, 2015.
  8. ↑ "Church, Robert Reed, Sr. (1839–1912)". BlackPast. November 19, 2007.
  9. ↑ Teresa Biddle-Douglass (March 1, 2018). "Fraternal and Solvent Savings Bank and Trust Company". Tennessee Encyclopedia. Tennessee Historical Society. Retrieved June 1, 2018.
  10. ↑ "Executive Committee National Negro Business League; 1. J. B. Bell, Houston, Tex.; 2. S.E. Courtney, M.D., Boston, Mass.; 3. W. L. Taylor, Richmond, Va.; 4. T. Thomas Fortune, New York City, Chairman; 5. N.T. Velar, Brinton, Pa.; 6. J. C. Jackson, Lexington, Ky.; 7. M. M. Lewey, Pensacola, Fla.; 8. E. P. Booze, Colorado Springs, Col.; 9. S. A. Furniss, M.D., Indianapolis, Ind.; 10. John E. Bush, Little Rock, Ark.; 11. James C. Napier, Nashville, Tenn".
  11. ↑ Verney, Kevern J. (2001). The Art of the Possible: Booker T. Washington and Black Leadership in the United States, 1881-1925. Routledge. ISBN   9780203055946.
  12. 1 2 Kenneth Hamilton (ed.), A Guide to the Records of the National Negro Business League. Bethesda, MD: University Publications of America, 1995.
  13. ↑ On Lynching and Other Crime, The North Wilkesboro Hustler (North Wilkesboro, North Carolina) September 7, 1906, page 1, accessed October 12, 2016 at https://www.newspapers.com/clip/6995846//
  14. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 "Executive Committee National Negro Business League; 1. J. B. Bell, Houston, Tex.; 2. S.E. Courtney, M.D., Boston, Mass.; 3. W. L. Taylor, Richmond, Va.; 4. T. Thomas Fortune, New York City, Chairman; 5. N.T. Velar, Brinton, Pa.; 6. J. C. Jackson, Lexington, Ky.; 7. M. M. Lewey, Pensacola, Fla.; 8. E. P. Booze, Colorado Springs, Col.; 9. S. A. Furniss, M.D., Indianapolis, Ind.; 10. John E. Bush, Little Rock, Ark.; 11. James C. Napier, Nashville, Tenn". NYPL Digital Collections.
  15. ↑ Field, Allyson (2015). Uplift Cinema: The Emergence of African American Film and the Possibility of Black Modernity. Duke University Press.
  16. ↑ "Article clipped from The New York Age". The New York Age . September 14, 1905. p. 1. Retrieved September 15, 2025.
  17. ↑ "Robert E. Clay obit (Greenwood Cemetery)". The Tennessean . June 26, 1961. p. 21. Retrieved September 16, 2025– via Newspapers.com.
  18. ↑ Washington, Booker T.; Harlan, Louis R. (1977). Booker T. Washington Papers Volume 6: 1901-2. Assistant Editor, Barbara S. Kraft. University of Illinois Press. p. 258. ISBN   978-0-252-00650-0.
  19. ↑ "Mame Stewart Josenberger (ca. 1868–1964)". Arkansas Women's Suffrage Centennial Project, Center for Arkansas History and Culture . 2017.
  20. ↑ Wilson, Dreck Spurlock (2004). African-American Architects: a Biographical Dictionary, 1865-1945 . New York City, NY: Routledge. pp.  253-257. ISBN   1135956286.
  21. ↑ "Negro Business League" (PDF). The New York Times . August 20, 1903 – via Times Machine.
  22. ↑ A Joint Resolution Honoring the Life and Memory of Clarence Lightner, Prominent Civic Leader, Politician and Businessman (PDF), North Carolina General Assembly, June 19, 2003, pp. 1–2, archived (PDF) from the original on March 3, 2016
  23. ↑ Theobald, Mark (2004). "C.R. Patterson; Greenfield Bus Body Co". CoachBuilt.
  24. ↑ Marlowe, Gertrude Woodruff (2003). A Right Worthy Grand Mission: Maggie Lena Walker and the Quest for Black Economic Empowerment. Howard University Press. ISBN   0882582119.
  25. ↑ J. Clay Smith, Jr., Emancipation: The Making of the Black Lawyer, 1844-1944. Philadelphia, PA: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1999; pg. 370.

Further reading

Primary sources

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