Louis Eugene King

Louis Eugene King (1898–1981) would have been the first black anthropologist to receive a doctorate from Columbia. He also did groundbreaking work in the field of anthropology. He studied at the wrong time; the Depression was the worst time for an anthropologist regardless of color to find work. Due to the circumstances King was pushed to the sidelines to become known as "The Anthropologist Who Never Was" (Harrison 1999:70).

Louis Eugene King (official United States Navy photo)

Anthropology and Vindication

Anthropology is a broad field that includes many subsets. The main fields are Archeology, Biological Anthropology, Linguistic, and Cultural. However Dr. Louis Eugene King focused on the cultural field.

Dr. Louis Eugene King is a little-known but important participant in the field of anthropology in the 20th Century. Focusing on the field of cultural anthropology, Dr. King emphasized the significance of cultural vindication, that is, proper documentation and study used to disprove harmful stereotypes, in his work at Columbia University and Howard University. Dr. King centered his studies on testing and subsequently disproving previously accepted ideas regarding intelligence level disparities between African American communities during the Great Migration period in the United States of America (1910-1930). If research like his, was not done to prove things like drapetomania wrong, then society would never had advance.

Biography

Early Life

Dr. Louis Eugene King was born in Barbados in 1898, the last of nine children. His parents died when he was a child, so he moved around a lot.[1] He was partly raised by his sister and her husband. He was a good student. He attended Dewitt Clinton High School, and Morgan College Academy.[2]

Education

Howard University

"He taught school for a year before he attended Howard University. He was the editor of the student newspaper at Howard which was later renamed The Hilltop (newspaper).[3] He was the president of the student body at Howard. He was a general studies major and earned a Bachelor of Science degree while he was there. He was admitted into Howard medical school but was forced to drop out due to family responsibility".[4]

Columbia University

He attended Columbia to attain a PhD in Anthropology so that he could teach at Howard University.[5] He was a lab assistant for Otto Klineberg and Melville Herskovits.[6] He also studied under famous anthropologists such as Franz Boaz and Ernest E. Just.[7] He was a good student and hard worker but was constantly plagued by financial difficulties. He was constantly working to support himself; he managed to gain grudging respect from his peers despite being a negro.[8] To help with his financial troubles, he applied for the Laura Spelman Rockefeller Memorial.[9] He used Franz Boaz as a reference, who gave him positive recommendations

"It seems to my mind that the opportunity for applying his knowledge is not unfavorable. I understand there is a good opportunity that he may be appointed at Howard University but I imagine that other Negro Universities will hardly be able to get along very long without some work in this line. I wish to repeat that I consider him well worthy of any support which may be given to him" [10]

He was invited to come back to teach at Howard but once he received his grant he decided to finish his work to receive a PhD.[11]

Dissertation

Louis Eugene King was one of, if not the first anthropologist who covered the African American communities in the United States. During the time that he was studying the black communities, it was more accepted to study Native American culture, as it was looked as a higher form of study than black culture.[12] He wanted to write objectively write about black community and family. He also focused on whether northern blacks were smarter than southern blacks, which is what popular belief indicated, that nature controlled intelligence. But he found through his studies that northern blacks didn't necessarily score better, but that intelligence was based on the environment of which the individual was raised in. This is all covered in his dissertation which was called "The Negro Life in Rural Community".[13]

Later Life

During the Depression there were very few jobs available for anthropology graduate students.[14] But he managed to get hired in 1934, as a junior historian at the Gettysburg National Military Park, but since he was the last the hired, he was the first fired.[15] In 1942 got a pick and shovel job at the Naval Supply Depot in Pennsylvania. He tried to resign when the war was over, but instead he became a management analyst.[16]

One of his officers heard his story and contacted Columbia and printed three dissertation copies.[17] He received his diploma in 1965; thirty years later he finally received his PhD.[18] After not finding an academic job, he left the anthropological field and worked at the Naval Supply Depot.[19]

Accomplishments

Theses were Dr. King's major accomplishments:[20]

1. He was one of the few recipients of Laura Spelman Rockefeller Memorial grant, even though he was at the mercy of the white social scientists.[21] Harrison stated that according to John Stanfield that they "gave scholarships only to blacks admitted into a graduate program in one of the social sciences. [But] once they were admitted they were at the mercy of the white social scientists who used these scholarship programs to get blacks to do their research".[22]

2. His dissertation was his most significant accomplishment because his was the first that focused on the community studies and fieldwork on the African American community.[23] Also shed light on migration and intelligence.[24] Selective migration is when a certain culture or "race" moves to a new region to live. Back then it was believed that northern blacks were smarter than southern blacks, and that they were because they were smart enough to move out of the south.[25] King concluded in his dissertation that it is the result of one's environment and not one's "innate intellectual abilities".[26]

3. His points toward political nature of academic study because policy makers needed information on southern black life, but by the time he finished the climate changed and he did not receive credit.[27]

4. King reminds the intellectual community the importance of kinship obligations, since he put aside his career to support his family and educate his children.[28]

5. He received a reward named after him called the Louis E. King Achievement awards at the Gettysburg College.[29]

Impact on the Black Anthropological Society

Even though Louis Eugene King may be a little-known figure he did have impact on black anthropology.[30] He was the first anthropologist to realize that people are shaped by their environment and not by nature, having completed his dissertation on the subject.[31] He focused on culture and not race, which he believed was used to stratify society to keep all people of color oppressed.[32]

References

1. (Harrison 1999:72)
2. (Harrison 1999:72)
3. (Harrison 1999:72)
4. (Harrison 1999:72)
5. (Harrison 1999:72)
6. (Harrison 1999:72)
7. (Harrison 1999:72)
8. (Harrison 1999:73)
9. (Harrison 1999:73)
10. (Harrison 1999:73)
11. (Harrison 1999:73)
12. (Harrison 1999,75)
13. (Harrison 1999,75)
14. (Harrison 1999:77)
15. (Harrison 1999:76)
16. (Harrison 1999:81)
17. (Harrison 1999:81)
18. (Harrison 1999,80)
19. (Harrison 1999:81)
20. Harrison Faye V, Harrison Ira E, African American Pioneers in Anthropology. University of Illinois Press/ Urbana and Chicago. 1999
21. Harrison Faye V, Harrison Ira E, African American Pioneers in Anthropology. University of Illinois Press/ Urbana and Chicago. 1999
22. Harrison Faye V, Harrison Ira E, African American Pioneers in Anthropology. University of Illinois Press/ Urbana and Chicago. 1999
23. (Harrison 1999:80)
24. (Harrison 1999:81)
25. (Harrison 1999:81)
26. (Harrison 1999:81)
27. (Harrison 1999:81)
28. (Harrison 1999:81)
29. (Harrison 1999:81)
30. (Harrison 1999:75)
31. (Harrison 1999:75)
32. (Harrison 1999:76)

• Buck Pem Davidson, In/Equality and Alternative Anthropology. CAT Publishing Company 2009
• Harrison Faye V, Harrison Ira E, African American Pioneers in Anthropology. University of Illinois Press/ Urbana and Chicago. 1999

African American Pioneers in Anthropology