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Nance, Ethel Ray(1899–1992)
An effective secretary and administrator who facil-
itated dynamic networks among artists and schol-
ars of the Harlem Renaissance period.
Born Ethel May Ray, she and her family
resided in Duluth, Minnesota. Nance came of age
in a town in which there were few African Ameri-
cans. Her father, an advocate of African-Ameri-
can migration to northern cities, gave his
daughter firsthand exposure to black activism and
community outreach. Nance accompanied her fa-
ther to the South in 1919 and was with him as he
extolled the freedoms and possibilities for African
Americans in the North. Her father later estab-
lished the first Duluth chapter of the NATIONAL
ASSOCIATION FOR THEADVANCEMENT OFCOL-
OREDPEOPLE(NAACP). According to Nance, it
was a horrific LYNCHINGin Duluth in March 1920
that galvanized Minnesotans to work for civil and
legal rights for African Americans. Thirteen
African-American men, employees of the John
Robinson Show Circus, were falsely accused of
rape. Four of them were lynched before a blood-
thirsty mob, whose size, historians debate, ranged
between 5,000 and 10,000. The first activist
Nance’s father invited to address members of the
newly established NAACP was W. E. B. DUBOIS,
the scholar with whom Ethel Nance would later
work closely.
Before she left Minnesota and relocated to
NEWYORKCITY, Nance was an active member of
several Minnesota organizations. She worked with
the Red Cross and also became the first African-
American policewoman in Duluth.

Nance’s involvement with the Harlem Renais-

sance began in 1923. She began working as secre-

tary for CHARLES S. JOHNSON, editor of

OPPORTUNITY. Nance was one of the visionary

women who encouraged the male leadership to

generate forums that would promote African-

American literary and artistic production. The fete

at the Manhattan CIVICCLUBwas one of the most

memorable events in which Nance played a major

organizational role. Nance eventually relocated to

Tennessee when Charles Johnson, who in 1946

would become the school’s first African-American

president, joined the faculty at FISKUNIVERSITY.

Nance developed close ties to the HARLEM

BRANCHof the NEWYORKPUBLICLIBRARY, located

at 135th Street. Librarian REGINAANDREWSwas

one of the women with whom Nance shared a flat in

the SUGAR HILL neighborhood. With Louella

Tucker, their third roommate, Nance and Andrews

hosted regular gatherings of emerging artists and

writers at the 580 St. Nicholas Avenue apartment

that became well known, according to historian

David Levering Lewis, as a “sort of Renaissance

USO, offering a couch, a meal, sympathy, and proper

introduction to wicked Harlem for newcomers on

the Urban League approved list” (Lewis, 127). Lewis

goes on to note that the apartment, which welcomed

writers such as LANGSTONHUGHES, ZORANEALE

HURSTON, and ERIC WALROND, actually “func-

tioned as a combination office and intelligence out-

post for the Urban League” (Lewis, 128).

Nance also worked closely with W. E. B.

DuBois. Years after her memorable first encounter

with him in Duluth, Nance worked as a secretary