MASON CRUM PAPERS, 1885-1974. 8.9 linear ft.
Educator, author, Methodist minister; born Frederick Mason Crum; A. B. Wofford College,
1909; Ph.D., University of South Carolina, 1925; Ll.D, 1950. Professor of Biblical
Literature, Duke University, 1930-1957. Author, Gullah: Negro Life in the Carolina Sea
Islands (1940) and other works. Correspondence, printed matter, hand- and typewritten
manuscripts of books and articles, clippings, photos and glass slides, and video and audio
tapes, with the bulk dates being 1931-1959. Dr. Crum was a professor of Biblical literature
who had interests in black history, psychology, race relations, and recent Methodist church
history. His major area of research was the Gullah communities of Edisto and St. Helena, two
of the South Carolina Sea Islands, with the bulk of work here dating from the 1930s. Other
areas of interest were moral education, pastoral counseling, and religious pageantry. He
taught one of the first black studies courses offered in the South (1954).
