Rivers Frederick papers

The papers of Dr. Rivers Frederick consist of circa 250 items of correspondence and approximately 125 items of non-correspondence. The non-correspondence occupies about eighty-five percent of the shelf space allotted to this collection.

Non-correspondence in these papers includes speeches and writings by Frederick; writings by others about Frederick; other collected writings; lists; programs and menus; diplomas and certificates; photographs; newspaper clippings; collected periodicals, books, and other collected items, including posthumous materials. A series of phonograph records are housed in box 2; oversized items are housed in box 3. Most of the materials, both correspondence and also non-correspondence, date from after World War II.

Most of the correspondence consists of letters of congratulation to Frederick upon the occasions of testimonial celebrations in his honor staged in 1947 and 1954. These congratulatory letters amount to a veritable catalog of central Southern black doctors and their black and white associates and of blacks in the industrial life insurance business in Louisiana at the time. Some are posthumous letters to Frederick's widow, Eloise Clarke Frederick. There are no more than four letters each from any one correspondent.

Among prominent persons represented within incoming correspondence are the following, with the years of their correspondence: Herbert Acuff, president of the International College of Surgeons, 1951; Will W. Alexander, vice-president of  the Julius Rosenwald Fund, 1947; Joseph Bartholomew, prominent New Orleans businessman, 1947; Roscoe C. Brown, chief of the office of Negro Health Work of the U.S. Health Service, 1947; Fred Brownlee, general Secretary of the American Missionary Association, 1947; Daniel E. Byrd, New Orleans civil rights activist, 1954; Gladys F. Cahn, Louisiana State Commander, American Cancer Society, 1947-1954; W.G. Carradine, president of the Standard Industrial Life Insurance Company of Louisiana, 1947; Giovanni Cavina, director and vice-president, Societa Tosco-Umbra di Chururgia, Florence, Italy, 1951; Ulysses Grant Dailey, leading African American surgeon, 1954 and n.d.; Matthew S. Davage, Secretary of the Department of Educational Institutions for Negroes of  the Methodist Church Board of Education, 1947; Jimmie H. Davis, Governor of Louisiana, 1946; Eugene H. Dibble, medical director, Tuskegee Institute, 1947; Joseph A. Hardin, prominent black New Orleans physician and Liberian consul, 1947; Raymond Hufft, Louisiana state director Selective Service System, 1950; James Lewis, Jr., president of the People's Industrial Life Insurance Company of Louisiana, 1947; Earl K. Long, Governor of Louisiana, 1951; Douglas L. Manship, Louisiana state director of Civil Defense,1951; Wade O. Martin, Jr. Secretary of State of Louisiana, 1951-1954; Mother Mary Agatha, president of Xavier University of Louisiana, 1954; Karl A. Meyer, secretary of the International College of Surgeons, 1953; deLesseps Story Morrison, New Orleans mayor, 1947; Alton Ochsner, leading New Orleans hospital administrator, 1947-1954; Kermit A. Parker, Commissioner, Louisiana State Industrial School for Colored Youths, 1949; J.E. Walker, president of the Universal Life Insurance Company, 1947-1954; Matthew Walker, chairman of the department of Surgery, Meharry Medical College, 1947; John M. Whitney, New Orleans Superintendant of Public Health, 1947; and Andrew J. Young, politician and pastor, 1947.

This collection was processed under a grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities.