Benjamin Quarles talks about the challenges in 1980 of locating primary resources in his area of scholarship–antislavery movements and the roles of African Americans in the American Revolution and the Civil War. Quarles also comments on the accounts, which were rare, of the contributions of African Americans to early epochs of American history, and the equally rare number of positive fictional portrayals of blacks in early American writing. Kent Mullikin also participated in this conversation.
At the time of this interview, Quarles was retired professor of history at Morgan State College. Mullikin was deputy director of the National Humanities Center.
This edition of Soundings was conducted by Wayne J. Pond.
