- Mass Daily Collegian staff ID of Judith Boucher Cameron ’75.
I ordered several microfilm rolls of the Massachusetts Daily Collegian from the campus library, prepared to spend hours looking for a story I wrote as a student. I got lucky. After scrolling through just a few, I found the story leading page three of the February 24, 1974 edition: “Dubois (sic) papers seen as valuable set” by Judy Boucher, my maiden name.
I dug up the article after the library received a grant from the Verizon Foundation that will put the W.E.B. Du Bois papers online. The papers are a breathtaking group of more than 100,000 items of original diaries, letters, photos, and ephemera, safely ensconced on the 25th floor of the library. They chronicle the life and times of the American icon; since 1994 the library has borne the Du Bois name.
My reporting documents the work of a curator charged with arranging, indexing, and describing the contents, and preparing it for microfilming. Microfilming was a revolutionary process for preserving materials and minimizing storage space. The process is being replaced with the creation of electronic copies accessed via computer.
From the Collegian, I went to work at small dailies and weeklies as well as at a large metropolitan newspaper, eventually finding my way back to campus as a staff writer.
I have never forgotten my Collegian days. It was my first taste of the real world: never ending deadlines, tension between the press and authority figures, and experiences that led to job offers. New England’s largest student daily helped me discover my role in keeping a community informed about its government and neighborhoods, exposing corruption, and giving voice to the vulnerable.
Through the Du Bois Collegian piece, the community learned about the arrival of the papers on campus and the process underway to preserve them. Since I felt I had a connection to the papers, I decided to examine the letters Du Bois exchanged with Mahatma Gandhi. When handed the folders containing the actual letters (I was expecting photo copies), a chill ran down my spine at the thought of reading and touching letters written by such historical giants.
On February 19, 1929, Du Bois wrote Gandhi, requesting an article for The Crisis, which Du Bois explained was read by African Americans whose grandparents were slaves. Du Bois got right to the point. “I know how busy you are with your own problems, but the race and color problems are world-wide, and we need your help.” Gandhi said he couldn’t write an article but instead sent a “love message.” The message in part reads: “Let not the 12 million Negroes be ashamed of the fact that they are the grandchildren of slaves. There is no dishonour in being slaves. There is dishonour in being slave-owners.”
I think I remembered my Du Bois Collegian story because I knew that the collection over time would gain stature. I’m told not a day goes by without a visit, telephone call, or email query about the Du Bois papers. The $200,000 Verizon grant will pay for digitizing the holdings, bringing equal access to anyone with a computer and internet connection.
