Robert F. Cohen, Jr. papers (MS.1U.C8)

The Robert F. Cohen, Jr. papers consist of a wide variety of materials relating to his experiences as a student activist at Brown University and as a community organizer around issues of poverty and racism in Providence and other Rhode Island communities, and New York City. The bulk of the collection relates to his work from 1966-1972 at various organizations.

Overall the collection comprises original materials created in the context of his organizing activities. These include minutes of meetings, research notes, press releases, instructional materials related to organizing, correspondence, leaflets, memoranda, and reports. There are also some published materials he used in the course of his work and research, including state budgets and annual reports. In addition he collected news clippings covering the events he helped to organize. The publications series contains newsletters of progressive organizations and underground publications, all related to community organizing, especially around racism and poverty. Of particular note to those interested in local history is the folder in the Rhode Island Fair Welfare subseries containing various Providence publications as well as Extra! in the Publications series, another Providence publication.

Some highlights of the collection include a copy of a note written by Norman Mailer excusing Cohen from class for attending an anti-Vietnam War rally in Washington D.C. in 1967 as part of CAC’s (Campus Action Council) Mobilization campaigns well as copies of protest songs from that demonstration. Also in the Campus Action Council subseries there are extensive CAC planning notes and minutes of meetings, alongside drafts of flyers and other original organizing materials. The Student Activism series also contains his SDS (Students from a Democratic Society) membership card and original SDS newsletters. Related to the semester he spent at Tougaloo there is a poem about his experience in the Tougaloo-Brown Impression catalog compiled in 1969 and an article on Welfare Rights Organizing in the Brown-Providence Summer Project Report. There is also a letter from Jan Hillegas that connects the Benefit Concerts CAC organized to the Mississippi Freedom of Information Service and a letter he wrote to Patty Seybold the day after the assassination of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. reflecting on how his experiences in Tougaloo informed his later political ideology. Other highlights include original reports documenting his research on gentrification and housing discrimination in both Providence and Newport, Rhode Island and discriminatory tracking practices in schools in Boston. As well as five notebooks that contain notes of meetings and research conducted while working for Rhode Island Fair Welfare, 1968-1970. Under the Rhode Island Fair Welfare subseries, there is also material related to the National Welfare Rights Organization (NWRO) whose People Against Poverty Campaign served as a precursor to Martin Luther King, Jr. and the Southern Christian Leadership Conference’s 1968 Poor People’s Campaign. Of particular interest to Brown students there is a folder concerning the NWRO’s Welfare Not Warfare Convention held at Brown in 1971.

These papers represent a valuable resource for those interested in researching campus activism at Brown University in the late 1960s,as well as community organizing around civil rights, welfare rights and housing and education discrimination nationally and locally from 1966-1972.