Negro History Week, a precursor to Black History Month, was established by Carter Woodson and the Association for the Study of Negro Life and History (ASNLH) in 1925, and first celebrated in February 1926. At Shaw Junior High School in Washington, D.C., painter and art educator Alma Thomas organized student activities as part of the celebrations honoring African American history and culture. Her scrapbook documents the Shaw Art Gallery exhibitions and school assemblies she organized in celebration of Negro History Week from 1930-1940. The scrapbook contains programs for the festivities and photographs of students at work in Thomas's classroom.
Negro History Week, a precursor to Black History Month, was established by Carter Woodson and the Association for the Study of Negro Life and History (ASNLH) in 1925 and first celebrated in February 1926. At Shaw Junior High School in Washington, D.C., painter and art educator Alma Thomas organized student activities as part of the celebrations honoring African American history and culture. Her scrapbook documents the Shaw Art Gallery exhibitions and school assemblies she organized in celebration of Negro History Week from 1930-1940. The scrapbook contains programs for the festivities and photographs of students at work in Thomas's classroom.
Alma Thomas was born in Columbus, Georgia in 1894, and would go on to be a major artist of the Washington Color School. She was known for her abstract paintings filled with dense patterns of colors. Thomas worked at Shaw Junior High School in Washington, D.C. from 1924 through 1960, when she retired to paint full time. Thomas's work has been exhibited at the White House and can be found in the permanent collections of major museums, including the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the National Museum of Women in the Arts, and the Smithsonian American Art Museum.To learn more about Alma Thomas, visit her fully digitized papers on the Archives of American Art website.
