A collection of photographs by pioneering black photographers from the last two centuries includes individual and family portraits, school and street scenes from a variety of sources. Original.

"A visual testimony of the black community through the photographer as witness, documenter, artist and recorder"--Back cover.

Surveys the work of African-American professional photographers from the mid-nineteenth to the mid-twentieth century: Jules Lion, Augustus Washington, James P. Ball, the Goodridge Brothers, Cornelius M. Battey, and Addison Scurlock.