Spelman College Dr. Johnnetta B. Cole Photograph Collection

Collection

Identifier: 0000-0000-0000-0165

Staff Only

Scope and contents

This collection was donated to Spelman College and is under the custodianship of the AUC Robert W. Woodruff Library Archives Research Center. The photographs in this collection were framed and found in Dr. Cole's office. The images include Dr. Cole pictured with various historical, political, and social figures.

Dates

Creation: 2002-2013, undated

Rights Statement

All materials in this collection are either protected by copyright or are the property of the Robert W. Woodruff Library of the Atlanta University Center, Inc., and/or the copyright holder as appropriate. For more information, please contact archives@auctr.edu.

Biographical note

In 1987, Johnnetta Betsch Cole, Ph.D., became Spelman College's seventh president and the first Black woman to lead the College that was founded specifically for the education of women of African descent.

Born in 1936 in Florida, Dr. Cole started her higher-education at the young age of 15 with early admission to Fisk University. She would later transfer and graduate from Oberlin College in 1957. She earned her master's and doctorate degrees in anthropology from Northwestern University in 1959 and 1967 respectively. She held teaching positions at several schools including Washington State University; the University of Massachusetts at Amherst; and Hunter College where she was professor of anthropology and director of the Latin American and Caribbean Studies Program until her departure in 1987 when she took the helm of Spelman College.

After a decade of service to Spelman, Dr. Cole remained in Atlanta while returning to the classroom at Emory University as the Presidential Distinguished Professor of Anthropology, Women's Studies and African-American Studies. In 2002, she became the president of Bennett College in North Carolina, the only other HBCU dedicated to educate Black women. She retired in 2007 and continued to serve as chair of the Johnnetta B. Cole Global Diversity and Inclusion Institute in Atlanta. In 2009, she was named director of the Smithsonian’s National Museum of African Art, a position she currently holds.

The recipient of more than 50 honorary degrees and numerous accolades, Dr. Cole has served on many boards including Home Depot and Merck. In 2004, Dr. Cole became the first African-American chair of the board of United Way of America. During her Spelman presidency, she was the first woman elected to serve on the board of Coca-Cola Enterprises. She currently chairs the board of the National Visionary Leadership Project and is on the Advisory Committee of America's Promise and the Points of Light Foundation. Dr. Cole is married to James D. Staton Jr., and has three sons, one step-son, and three grand children.