W. E. B. Du Bois was born to Dutch and African American parents in Great Barrington, Massachusetts. He studied at Fisk, Harvard, and Berlin Universities, earning his Ph.D. at Harvard in 1895. He taught economics and history at Atlanta University from 1897 until 1910. Du Bois helped found the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) in 1909. He supported pan-Africanism and independence for African colonies. From 1910 until 1934, Du Bois edited the NAACP’s magazine The Crisis. In 1932 he returned to Atlanta University, where he taught sociology until 1944. Du Bois co-chaired the 1945 Pan-American Conference. In 1961 he joined the Communist Party and moved to Ghana, where he died. Du Bois was the author of several books, including The Souls of Black Folk (1903), John Brown (1909), The Negro (1915), and Color and Democracy (1945).
