Collection (1943, 2001) consisting of a report entitled Profile of the Members of the B–1 U. S. Navy Band of World War II, 1942-2001, submitted by W. F. Carlson, Jr., B-1 Executive Treasurer and Calvin F. Morrow, B-1 Secretary of the U. S. Navy B-1 Band, the first all-African American Navy band during World War II, and a Servicemen's Map of the United States and Insignia of the Armed Forces, Published by Fred Harvey (Chicago, IL: Rand McNally and Company © [1943]) Folding map.
Collection (1942 – 2014, undated) of programs, notes, photographic prints, etc. documenting the history and membership of the U. S. Navy B-1 Band, the first All-African American band to serve in the U. S. Navy during World War II, including reunion programs, historical and biographical sketches and photographs of the band and its members, rosters, and the music and lyrics for naval hymns.
Collection contains mainly material related to the African American Navy Band members who served at the Great Lakes Naval Base during World War II (1942-1945). This material includes programs and related material from the February 28-March 2, 2003, salute to these African American band members that was held in Chicago, Illinois, and from former band member Carl Foster's participation in a symposium sponsored by the North Carolina Museum of History in 2003. Other material includes programs (1987) for concerts by the North Carolina Jazz Ensemble and a 1945 USO Hawaii booklet.
Collection (circa 1988) of research material, interview transcripts, audiovisual materials, and clippings compiled by the donor for his UNC-TV documentary Boogie in Black and White, a film about the making of the movie Pitch a Boogie Woogie. This movie was shot in Greenville, North Carolina in 1947 using a local cast of African American musicians and actors, by John W. Warner, then owner of the Plaza Theatre in Greenville. The material in this collection includes an outline, subject background and questions regarding "The Block", a popular area in Greenville, all used for the making of Boogie in Black and White. Also included are questions for interviewees. Photocopy typescripts.
Collection (1942-1945) of materials belonging to Wray Raphael Herring, a member of the U.S. Navy B-1 Band which was the first all-African American Navy Band during World War II. Included are programs, clippings, and sound recordings of radio broadcasts (78 RPM vinyl radio transcription discs) relating to the U.S. Navy B-1 Band; and official correspondence, programs, printed forms, sheet music signed by members of the U.S. Navy B-1 Band, a poem and other printed materials relating to Herring's service in the U.S. Navy B-1 Band, the U.S. Navy Pre-Flight School Band and Orchestra ("The Cloudbuster Band") at Chapel Hill, North Carolina, and the Manana Ridge Band (while at the Manana Barracks in Hawaii).
Mattie Barber Sloan was the bookkeeper and assistant to Thomas Store Winstead for his group Winstead's Mighty Minstrels, a Fayetteville, North Carolina, Black Minstrel group who toured the Eastern United States from 1931 to 1956. This collection contains documents and memorabilia (1927-1956, undated) kept by Mattie Sloan related to Winstead's Mighty Minstrels and other Black Minstrel groups such as Irvin C. Miller's "Brown Skin Models". Included are ledgers (1944, 1951, 1954, undated) recording ticket sales, salaries, and routes for the Winstead group and photographs, work licenses, advertising circulars and cards, and a poster. The strength of the collection is the historical significance that shows the involvement of African Americans as performers and managers that were not often included in standard histories of circuses and vaudeville.