Foreman read about the Atlanta Commission on Interracial Cooperation while in London
Foreman decided to work for the Commission on Interracial Cooperation in Atlanta after being exposed to different views of race relations in London. He had black classmates and read about the Commission for the first time.
Citing this Excerpt
Oral History Interview with Clark Foreman, November 16, 1974. Interview B-0003. Southern Oral History Program Collection (#4007) in the Southern Oral History Program Collection, Southern Historical Collection, Wilson Library, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.
Full Text of the Excerpt
So I went to the London School of Economics
and there I had a very different kind of experience. Of course there
were all kinds of people there from all over the world. A great many
Negro students, some of whom I got to know quite well. One of the
crucial things that happened was that I was given a book to review for
the school paper. The book was J. H. Oldham's Christianity
and the Race Problem. Now my parents had been writing me all
the time urging me to come on home and get to work, you know, don't just
stay over in Europe indefinitely. But when I read Oldham's book, he told
about the starting of the Interracial Commission, the Commission on
Interracial Cooperation, it was called, and what a good job they were
doing in Atlanta. Well, here I was from Atlanta, reading a book in
London, learning about what was happening here in my own home town that
I had never heard of before. So I decided to come home and go to work
for the Interracial Commission. When I came home I told father that's
what I wanted to do and he said "Well, I know the head of it
very well, Dr Ashby Jones. He's a very close friend of mine. And I will
arrange for him to see you." So he did. I went to see Dr Jones
and he was very kind, but he said I should see Will Alexander, the
director. I went to see Will Alexander and told him that I wanted to
work with the Commission.