Dates

• Existence: July 1, 1911 - June 13, 2003

Biography

Lucile Harris Bluford, an African American journalist and activist, was born July 1, 1911 in Salisbury, North Carolina to John Henry Bluford and Viola C. Harris. Her father was an educator, and the family moved to Kansas City in 1921, after her mother’s death in 1915, where he taught science at Lincoln High School for 30 years. At Lincoln High School she discovered her life’s vocation working on the school newspaper and the yearbook as well as at the Kansas City Call after school. She graduated from Lincoln in 1928 as class valedictorian and enrolled in the University of Kansas School of Journalism, graduating with honors in 1932. After working for a summer for The Daily World in Atlanta, Georgia, she returned to Kansas City to take a position as a reporter for the Kansas City American. She soon moved to its rival paper, The Call, at the invitation of Chester A. Franklin. She stayed at The Call for the rest of her career, advancing from cub reporter to city editor, then to managing editor and finally editor, owner, and publisher.

In 1939 Miss Bluford applied to the University of Missouri in Columbia to do graduate work in journalism. She was denied admission because she was Black, and filed suit against the University in a case that ultimately went to the Missouri Supreme Court. Although she lost her case, it resulted in the establishment of a School of Journalism at Lincoln University under the “separate but equal” doctrine. She finally received a degree from the University of Missouri in 1989 in the form of an honorary doctorate.

In her career of 69 years with The Call, Lucile Bluford made the weekly newspaper a force for fighting discrimination and advancing the cause of African Americans in Kansas City. She served on the national board of the NAACP and was active in numerous civic and community organizations. She was honored by a host of institutions, culminating in being named Kansas Citian of the Year in 2002. Kansas City Public Library dedicated its Lucile H. Bluford Branch after her in 1988.

Lucile Bluford died June 13, 2003.

Sources:

Beveridge, Mary. “Lucile H. Bluford: Journalist, 1911-2003.” Missouri Valley Special Collections. Kansas City Public Library, 2004. Web. 13 Nov. 2012.



Lucile H. Bluford Exhibit. Kansas City public library. https://kclibrary.org/bluford/exhibit

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