Southern University at Shreveport Black Ethnic Archives Preservation Assessment

FAIN: PG-52101-13

Southern University at Shreveport (Shreveport, LA 71107-4704)
Raegan Stearns (Project Director: May 2012 to April 2016)

A preservation assessment of 2,000 linear feet of manuscripts, books, photographs, and other items related to the history of Southern University at Shreveport, a historically black university founded in 1967, as well as to the history of the surrounding region. The collection focuses on the institutional records of the university and includes letters, yearbooks, budgets, and faculty research from the Shreveport campus as well as materials from other branches of Louisiana's A&M College System to which it belongs. The collection also contains print and microfilm versions of the "Shreveport Sun" (1927-2012), the oldest African American weekly in Louisiana, and personal papers of black educators and religious and civic leaders in northwest Louisiana.

Southern University at Shreveport's Black Ethnic Archives (BEA) is requesting funding from the NEH Preservation Assistance Grant for Smaller Institutions to allow a qualified archival consultant to assess its current preservation practices and to make recommendations designed to ensure the proper management of the archives' collections. The BEA collects, preserves, and makes available the original files and records documenting the underrepresented history of African Americans in Northwest Louisiana and contains approximately 2000 linear feet of materials. It manages the historical records of Southern University at Shreveport, the collections of prominent African American educators, civic and religious leaders, and businesspersons from the area, and is the home of The Shreveport Sun newspaper collection. The Sun is the oldest weekly African American newspaper in Louisiana and is the most comprehensive existing record of the lives of African Americans in Northwest Louisiana.