Jean Blackwell Hutson
1914–1998
Jean Blackwell Hutson was an African American librarian, archivist, curator, and finally chief of the New York Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture from 1948 to 1980. She also taught classes in Black Studies at the City College of New York from 1962-1971. Additionally, the then president of Ghana, Kwame Nkrumah hired Hutson to assist with the development and creation of the African Collection at the University of Ghana after meeting her at the library and being impressed by her. During the two years she worked in Ghana, Hutson loved being in a place where she was not discriminated against because of her race.
In her 32 years as chief, she grew the Schomburg Collection from 15,000 volumes to 75,000 volumes. One of her big achievements was acquiring the archives of her friend Langston Hughes, the Black writer known as a leader of the Harlem Renaissance. Under her care, the center became known for its collections on the Civil Rights and Black Panther movements
Hutson was a major fund-raiser for building the new Schomburg Corporation Center, designed by Max Bond. It opened to the public when she retired in 1980. In the decade following her retirement, she was active in the Information Sciences, during the pioneering years when they started building the foundations of using computers in the storage and retrieval of information. She served on the National Commission on Libraries’ Task Force on Library and Information Services to Cultural Minorities which developed plans to meet national library and information needs.