Welcome to Anna Julia Cooper’s Papers & Collection. This is a working list of Cooper’s known papers and collections of primary documents, which have been scattered throughout many institutions, libraries, and repositories. Some collections, like the Anna Julia Cooper Collection at Howard University, encompass a large range of materials, while others may only include one or two items. This list and links to the associated collections is part of the mission of the Black Women’s Organizing Archive to bring together the scattered archival materials of nineteenth-century Black women intellectuals and organizers in order to recover their larger body of work, their intellectual thought, and their contributions to the social movements and communities they helped build.
*Primary research locating extant collections of Cooper’s writings conducted by Sabrina Evans between 2020-2021.
Digital Collections
Howard University
The Anna Julia Cooper Collection contains digitized letters, manuscripts, personal papers, published papers, and scrapbooks written by or pertaining to Anna Julia Cooper and the Grimké family.
Library of Congress
Contains a photograph of Anna Julia Cooper.
New York Public Library
The Schomburg Center has a digital image of Anna Julia Cooper as a teacher and author of A Voice From the South.
Smithsonian
The Virtual Archives’ exhibition records include a number of Anna Julia Cooper items:
- Anna J. Cooper seated on veranda
- Dr. Anna J. Cooper in her garden, home & patio, #1
- Dr. Anna J. Cooper in her garden, home & patio, #2
- Dr. Anna Cooper in parlor of 201 T Street, N.W., then the Registrar’s Office of Frelinghuysen University
- Scurlock Studio Records, Series 1: Black and White Photographs contains a number of Cooper photographs; digitized through Umbra Search
University of Massachusetts – Amherst
The W.E.B. Du Bois Papers contains digitized letters exchanged between Du Bois and Anna Julia Cooper.
University of Michigan
Through Hathitrust provides a full digital copy of the 1892 edition of A Voice From the South.
University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
Documenting the South provides a digital copy of the 1892 edition of A Voice From the South with the frontispiece picture.
Swarthmore College
The Branson-Jackson Family Papers includes two letters from Anna Julia Cooper to Anna M. Jackson. These letters were digitized by the In Her Own Right project.
Non-Digital Collections
Duke University
The Anna Julia Cooper Papers, 1934-1951 Collection contains nine items relating to Anna Julia Cooper and the placement of the Charlotte Forten Grimké diaries.
Fisk University
The Chesnutt, Charles W. Collection (Supplement 1), 1898-1942 (PDF) contains two pamphlets written by Anna Julia Cooper:
- “Equality of Races and the Democratic Movement” (Sub-Series-4-Pamphlets, 2-12)
- “Legislative Measures Concerning Slavery in the United States” (Sub-Series-4-Pamphlets, 2-13)
Oberlin College
Has two collections with materials relating to Anna Julia Cooper.
- The Alumni Records, 1833-present contains biological and genealogical information relating to Cooper and other alumni
- The Azariah Smith Root Papers, 1881-1986 contains correspondence with Cooper, among others
Smithsonian
Houses several on-site collections relating to Anna Julia Cooper:
- Anna J. Cooper: A Voice from the South Exhibition Records
- The Dunbar Legacy: Dr. Sterling A. Brown Lecture on Anna J. Cooper
- The Dunbar Legacy: Sallie Underdue and Herbert Nicholson Lecture
- Anna J. Cooper Exhibit: Music, Literary Reading, and Sound Effects
- Anna J. Cooper Exhibit: Puppet Show
- Anna J. Cooper Exhibit: Audio Tour
- Anna J. Cooper Exhibit: Student Tests
- Pinpoint Production: Anna Julia Cooper
University of Delaware
The Alice Dunbar-Nelson papers contains two notes from Anna Julia Cooper to Alice Dunbar-Nelsons (MSS 113, Alice Dunbar-Nelson Papers, box 5, folder 120 and folder 126).
East Carolina University
Has a microform collection of The Ivy Leaf 1921-1998: A Chronicle of Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority, the official magazine of the AKA sorority. Reel 1 contains the 1926 issue (Vol. 5 No. 1), which includes a national convention speech by Cooper on the role of AKA women, fraternities, and sororities as well as a portrait of Cooper.