O.C.W. Taylor papers

The papers of Orlando Capitola Ward Taylor outline Taylor’s career as a New Orleans Public School teacher and principal, print and broadcast journalist, public relations professional, and freemason. The correspondence and clippings within the collection concern Reconstruction-era Superintendent of Education for Louisiana William G. Brown, and other collected materials. Many of the photographs in the collection mainly depict Taylor’s masonic ties and work in broadcasting. Taylor’s writings consist of newspaper articles pertaining to the topic of freemasonry. Of particular interest in the collection are a 1964 telegram invitation to the White House, a post-WWII souvenir folder similar to Taylor’s earlier Crescent City Pictorial, and a photograph from the 1936 Illinois Club Mardi Gras Ball. Also of note are World War II era images of the Civilian Defense Expo at Xavier University in New Orleans, Louisiana, in 1942.

Notable personages within the photographic images include Ralph Bunche, Mary Mcleod Bethune, John Wesley Dobbs, J.K. Haynes, John G. Lewis, Jr., J. Ernest Wilkins, and Thurgood Marshall.