Zora Neale Hurston

n 1939, at the height of her literary acclaim, Zora Neale Hurston joined the faculty of North Carolina Central University – then called the North Carolina College for Negroes – with a charge from President James E. Shepard to organize a theater program and produce African-American plays.

Building connections with faculty and students at the then-segregated University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Hurston collaborated with UNC-CH drama professor Paul Green, playwright of the 1927 Pulitzer Prize-winning In Abraham’s Bosom.

Her brief North Carolina experience marked only one chapter in the story of a lively, gregarious intellectual who was also an anthropologist and folklorist, dedicated to telling the story of the African-American culture.

Source:https://ncheritagecalendar.com/honorees/zora-neale-hurston/
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"The curriculum design was arranged in three academic periods, each period having three sections. The curriculum emphasized dramatic literature (English and American), history of the theater, voice, acting and directing training, scene construction, set painting, and stage lighting. The year 1939-40 was also the same year that the nationally renowned folklorist, novelist, and playwright Zora Neale Hurston was hired by James E. Shepard to teach drama. Her reputation for staging folkloric performances caught Shepard's attention. While at NCCU, Miss Hurston directed most of her attention to developing her folklore theater with Paul Green in Chapel Hill and left before she staged any plays at the University. She was followed by Caroline B. Day in 1940-41.".

Source:
http://www.nccu.edu/.../artsands.../theatredrama/history.cfm

*Photo: Zora Neale Hurston on NCCU campus (cropped).
Standing is Zora Neale Hurston, famous Black novelist, playwright, folklorist & anthropologist at a football game at then N.C.C. for Negroes. She was also a professor in our drama dept. from 1939-40