Rayford W. Logan, historian, editor, columnist, and public servant, died on November 4, 1982, at the Howard University Hospital in Washington, D.C. A Phi Beta Kappa graduate of Williams College in 1917, he saw action as a first lieutenant with the United States Army in Europe during World War I. During the immediate postwar years, he remained in Europe and served as secretary of the Pan-African Congress at its meetings in Paris, London, and Lisbon, Upon his return to the United States, he pursued graduate studies at Harvard, where he earned the degrees of master of arts and doctor of philosophy. Alternating study with teaching, he served as Professor of History at Virginia Union University and head of the Department of History at Atlanta University. In 1938 he joined the Department of History at Howard University and served as chairman until his retirement in 1965. He was immediately reappointed Professor of History and Historian of the University. From 1972 to 1974 he held the title of Distinguished Professor.
Logan was a prolific writer and productive scholar. He was foreign affairs editor for the Pittsburgh Courier from 1945 to 1948 and edited the Journal of Negro History in 1950-51. Outstanding among his works are The Diplomatic Relations of the United States with Haiti, 1776-1891 (1941); The Operation of the Mandate System in Africa (1942); The Senate and the Versailles Mandate System (1945); The Negro and the Post-War World: A Primer (1945); The African Mandates in World Politics (1948); The Negro in American Life and Thought: The Nadir, 1877-1901 (1954); The Negro in the United States (1957); Haiti and the Dominican Republic (1968); and Howard University, the First Hundred Years, 1867-1967 (1969). Among the works that he edited are What the Negro Wants (1944); Memoirs of a Monticello Slave (1951); and W. E. B. Du Bois, A Profile (1971). At the time of his death, he and Michael Winston had just completed the task of co-editing The Dictionary of American Negro Biography, which was published January 31, 1983. He had also completed a group of essays, which will be published in 1984 under the title The International Struggle for Human Rights. He was a contributor of reviews and articles to many newspapers and magazines as well as to the principal journals in his field.
Logan was active in numerous civic, learned, and professional organizations; and he performed many tasks in his role as a public servant. Just before World War II, he served in the office of the Coordinator of InterAmerican Affairs in the Department of State. During the war, he chaired a federal committee on the participation of Negroes in the national defense. From 1947 to 1950 he represented the American Teachers Association on the United States National Commission for UNESCO. In 1950-51 he was the director of the Association for the Study of Negro Life and History. The huge agenda of work that he always had before him, the uncompromising and persistent demands he made on himself to adhere to the highest standards of excellence, and the incessant, backbreaking toil that he required of himself were enough to challenge the most stouthearted.
Logan’s signal accomplishments are a matter of record and can be examined by anyone who wishes to do so. What cannot be readily known except by those who knew him well were the extraordinary qualities of character and personality that made his remarkable career possible. First, there was the discipline that he always imposed on himself. There were no odds too difficult to overcome, no problems impossible to solve, and no obstacles too high to surmount. Second, the standard of excellence that early became the Logan hallmark was reflected in everything he did. Finally, he was ever the teacher, even when he was unaware that he was engaged in pedagogy. Those who read his works as well as those who were in his classes will testify to his talents as a teacher.
Many honors came to Logan. He was a Fulbright Research Fellow in France. Haiti made him a Commander of the National Order of Honor and Merit. Williams College and Howard University conferred honorary degrees on him. In 1980 he received the Spingarn Medal, awarded annually by the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People to the Negro who “shall have reached the highest achievement in his field of activity.”
