lived there until his death. He also established and
operated a mentoring program for Harlem’s youth
and an intensive residential treatment program to
help turn young people’s lives around, much as he
had done for himself.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Boyd, Herb. “Claude Brown-Tribute.” Black Issues
Book Review 4, no. 3 (May/June 2002): 80.
Smith, Sidone. Where I’m Bound. Westport, Conn.:
Greenwood Press, 1974.
Carlos Perez
Brown, Frank London (1927–1962)
Novelist, journalist, and activist Frank London
Brown was born in Kansas City, Kansas, to parents
Frank London Brown, Sr., and Myra Myrtle Brown
Frank London in October 1927. Brown, who grew
up in Chicago, graduated from Roosevelt Uni-
versity in 1951, after also attending Wilberforce
University. He attended Kent College of Law and
received a M.A. degree from the University of
Chicago in 1960. He pursued doctoral studies
at the University of Chicago with the Commit-
tee on Social Thought. Brown had various inter-
ests; he was a labor organizer and a jazz musician
who was closely connected with the Chicago jazz
music scene. He performed with such musicians
as Thelonious Monk, Dizzy Gillespie, and Gene
Ammons.
Brown’s novels include Trumbull Park (1959)
and Mythmaker (1969). Brown was also known for
his short stories, which appeared in Chicago Maga-
zine, the Chicago Review, Down Beat, Ebony, Negro
Digest, Southwest Review, and the Chicago Review
Anthology.
Brown’s most famous work, Trumbull Park, is
based on true events. From the mid-1950s to the
mid-1960s, Trumbull Park Homes was a govern-
ment program designed to end segregation forc-
ibly. The resistance against black families moving
into a white residential area was “massive and in-
tractable” (Washington, 32), turning the area into
a war zone. Homemade bombs were lobbed into
the housing development every night, and blacks
were prevented from using any of the neighbor-
hood churches, parks, or stores. In Trumbull Park,
when Buggy and Helen Martin move into Trum-
bull Park Homes, they are faced with malice and
violence. Rather than focus solely on the anger that
the Martins clearly feel about the ongoing hostil-
ity, Brown shows the strain and consequence on
his characters of having to face constant violence
with nonviolence. He shows the Martins’ day-to-
day life, further humanizing them. Brown’s great-
est skill in telling the Martins’ story is the authentic
representation of black life, dialogue, and idiom.
Brown depicts “thoroughly respectable” (79), “in-
telligent, hardworking, and stable” (79) black fam-
ilies. They are not merely interested in their ability
to imitate whites.
Mythmaker, Brown’s second novel (also his
M.A. thesis), which was published posthumously,
is set on Chicago’s South Side; it is less optimistic
than Trumbull Park. The main character, Ernest
Day, briefly escapes the ghetto, only to be forced
back to it in disillusionment and despair. Day’s
quest to find his identity and place to live in the
world is illustrated in his struggle against failure
and ruin.
Brown was awarded the John Hay Whitney
Award for Trumbull Park. He died of leukemia on
March 12, 1962, in Illinois.BIBLIOGRAPHY
Fleming, Robert E. “Overshadowed by Richard
Wright: Three Black Chicago Novelists.” Negro
American Literature Forum 7, no. 3 (Autumn
1973): 75–79.
Washington, Mary Helen. “Desegregating the 1950s:
The Case of Frank London Brown.” Japanese Jour-
nal of American Studies 10 (1999): 15–32.
Kim Hai Pearson
Brian JenningsBrown, Sterling Allen (1901–1989)
Intellectual, educator, mentor, folklorist, cultural
guardian, and poet, Sterling Allen Brown was bornBrown, Sterling Allen 79