Photo credits: Gilder Lehrman Center
On January 25, 1890, Timothy Thomas Fortune officially established the National Afro-American League.
It was an organization dedicated to racial harmony and self-sufficiency long before it became known as the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP). Fortune presided over a meeting at Rochester, New York, in September 1898, which had been arranged by A.M.E. Zion’s pastor, Bishop Alexander Walters.
The conference was organized with the objective of resurrecting the League’s fortunes. The newly constituted organization, which was known as the National Afro-American Council, was in operation until around 1908. Initially, Walters served as president of the Council, while Fortune served as chairman of the executive committee throughout its inception.
In time, many of the League’s and later the Council’s supporters started financially backing the NAACP, which expanded to become one of the most prominent U.S. organizations to emerge from the anti-racism movement.
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