Location: Walters’ Graham Auditorium
Registration is required.
In honor of Women’s History Month, we highlight the Baltimore-based and woman-led publication the AFRO. Dr. Frances “Toni” Draper, CEO and Publisher of the AFRO, will be in conversation with Lynley Herbert, Robert and Nancy Hall Curator of Rare Books and Manuscripts. Draper and Herbert will share stories of accomplishments in the AFRO’s long-running history and draw connections to women creating and publishing books and manuscripts that are in the Walters collection. This program is connected to New on the Bookshelf: The Creative Power of Women, on view in our Level 3 Manuscripts gallery from December 14, 2023 to June 16, 2024.
About the Guest Speaker:
Dr. Frances Murphy Draper has been a community leader in her native Baltimore for decades, with leadership positions in the AME Zion Church, journalism, and education. In February 2018, she was named chairman of the board and publisher of the 131-year-old AFRO American Newspapers. As a fourth-generation family member, “Toni” grew up in the AFRO, serving as a reporter, a branch manager in New Jersey, and as president of the company from 1987 to 1999. A sought-after speaker and author of two books, Dr. Draper serves on several boards and is a founding member of Word in Black where she is Board Chair.
In 2021, the Local Media Association (LMA) named her “Content and Audience Innovator of the Year” and in 2022 the National Newspaper Publishers Association (NNPA) voted her “Publisher of the Year” and presented the AFRO with the John B. Russwurm award, designating it as the best Black Newspaper in the country. Dr. Draper is now the first vice chair of the NNPA Board and is also a member of Delta Sigma Theta Sorority, Inc., a national public service sorority co-founded in 1913 by her grandmother Vashti Turley Murphy.
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