Sale 2471 - Printed & Manuscript African Americana, March 29, 2018

82 c   (ART.) Papers of the art- ist, photographer, and graphic designer Louise E. Jefferson. Hundreds of items in 5 boxes (3 lin- ear feet); condition generally strong. Vp, 1925-90 [4,000/6,000] Louise E. Jefferson (1905-2002) was an artist, graphic designer, photogra- pher, author, and cartographer. She was best-known for her 1974 book “The Decorative Arts of Africa,” her long ten- ure as art director for Friendship Press, and the series of historical and educa- tional maps she created for that press such as “Americans of Negro Lineage.” She was born and raised inWashington, DC, launched her career in New York in time for the Harlem Renaissance, and retired in 1968 to Litchfield, CT. See Notable Black AmericanWomen II, pages 328-330. Highlights of this large collection include her original design for a map, “The Iroquois Confederacy 1650” * 8 of her printed maps and posters for Friendship Press and other publishers, including“UprootedPeopleoftheU.S.A.” and the small-format “Twentieth Century Americans of Negro Lineage” * Autograph Letter Signed from artist Romare Bearden, 1968 * A group of 9 drawings and test printings for her Decorative Arts of Africa * 44 photo- graphs, most of them fine art prints of work she did in Africa and New York circa 1959-61, including a photo of South African singer Miriam Makeba * A sheet of negatives labeled “Marshalls,” apparently taken at the home of Thurgood Marshall, her neighbor in the Morningside Heights cooperative in New York * Carbon-copy script for a documentary on Gordon Parks (possibly unproduced), for which Jefferson served as art director *The typed manuscript for “Biographical Notes onTwentieth Century Afro-Americans,” marked up by Jefferson for layout, and featuring a biography of “Louise E. Jefferson, creator of the pictomap” * Her scrapbook of newspaper and magazine clippings, 1925-1936, covering race relations, art, and more * and a small unsigned framed pencil drawing of an African sculpture by Jefferson. Jefferson was also a collector of AfricanAmericana. Included are 3 items from her collection: a scrapbook of the Brown-Hinton-Lassiter family circa 1910-30 * Cigarette card of 1902 boxing champion Joe Gans * and an estate document for inheritance of slaves,Texas, 1861.Also included are hundreds of books and pamphlets from her collection, most relating to her career and wide-ranging interests: issues of The Crisis, Cavalcade of the American Negro, and Negro Digest, a copy of “Ebony andTopaz, a Collectanea” (lacking a leaf), works on African-American bibliography, and others relating to book design and publishing. Many of the pamphlets were designed by Jefferson or relate to her career.A more detailed inventory of the collection is available upon request.