LHRT (Library History Round Table)

 - Librarians We Have Lost-Sesquicentennial Memories -1976-2026

Wendell Leonard Wray was the first Black man to graduate from the Carnegie Institute of Technology School (Pittsburgh) and was the first African American man hired by the Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh.

Wendell Wray was born in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, in 1926. He grew up in the Beltzhoover neighborhood, attending South Hills High School. Among his early interests were reading, making Alexander Calder inspired mobiles, and establishing communicative fluency of the Spanish language. His father, an engineering graduate of Booker T. Washington's Tuskegee Institute, was the first black engineer hired by Duquesne Light in Pittsburgh.

Wray was a Veteran of WWII (U.S. Army). Under the GI Bill he attended Bates College, Lewiston, Maine.  During his years at Bates, he also served the Black community in Pittsburgh with summers of service at Camp James Weldon Johnson, the city's Urban League camp for young Black youth. Wray graduated from Bates in 1950, Phi Beta Kappa and B.A. in Spanish and Psychology.

He then enrolled at the Carnegie Institute of Technology and was the first African American man to graduate from the school. (Masters, Library Science, 1952).

 Wray was the first African American man hired by the Carnegie Public Library of Pittsburgh where he worked first in the Adult Circulation department, and later in the Public Affairs Division.

From 1959 to 1973, Wray worked at the New York Public Library. He began as an Adult Group Specialist, which entailed overseeing cultural activities at over 80 individual branches and organizing and regularly presenting at book and film discussion groups.

In 1964-1965, Wray served as the Acting Curator of the NYPL's Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture. Following this, he assumed leadership of the North Manhattan Library Project, an outreach program targeted at the disadvantaged, based at Harlem's Countee Cullen Regional Library. He served in this role for eight years. [i]

During the summer of 1973, Wray attended Columbia University's program  in Oral History. Upon completion of the course, Wray founded the Schomburg Center's Department of Oral History. [ii] Notable among his oral histories was   "The Reminiscences of A. Philip Randolph," labor unionist and civil rights activist who organized and led the Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters, the first successful African American-led labor union. [iii]

Wendell Leonard Wray left the New York Public Library to assume a faculty position at the University of Pittsburgh School of Library and Information Science in 1973 (The Carnegie Institute School had moved to the University of Pittsburgh in 1966). [iv]  Wray developed and perfected the school's Oral History/ Oral Traditions and African American Bibliography classes. [v] He was also named the School's Distinguished Alumnus.

In 1981, Wray was appointed Chief of the Schomburg Center at New York Public Library.

 He resumed teaching at the University of Pittsburgh in 1983. He taught about library services to the underserved, and about African American bibliography. He was beloved by his students for his experience, his very caring approach to their professional education, his absolute integrity and his professional demeanor. [vi]

Wendell Wray was honored with Professor Emeritus Status in 1988. He continued in this capacity until he moved to Oakland, California, in 1995. Prior to relocation, he donated his extensive personal library to Chatham College in Pittsburgh, Pa.

Wray was an inveterate traveler, especially in the Hispanic world where his fluency in Spanish was an asset. He was particularly fond of visiting Spain and Puerto Rico. He moved to the Bay area in California in 1992 but maintained close ties with colleagues in Pittsburgh. He lived on the shores of Lake Merritt in Oakland CA and was active in the Episcopal parishes of the Church of the Advent of Christ the King in San Francisco, and St. Paul's Church in Oakland.

A requiem service was held in San Francisco at the Episcopal Church of the Advent of Christ the King on October 4, 2003. A memorial service in Pittsburgh was held on October 17, 2003, at Calvary Episcopal Church. At his request, his ashes were distributed over the lake at Camp James Weldon Johnson where he served as a counselor in the 1940's. 

Sources:

American Libraries, Nov.2003, Vol. 34 Issue 10, p58.

"Wendell Leonard Wray". East Bay Times. 31 August 2003

African Heritage Room Committee / Wendell L. Wray Memorial Award - Graduate | Nationality Rooms

Guide to the Wendell L. Wray Papers, 1885-2003. Wendell L. Wray Papers, 1885-2003, UA.90.F88, University Archives, Archives & Special Collections, University of Pittsburgh Library System. Processed by Sean Kilcoyne.

Wendell L. Wray - Wikipedia

Notes:

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Kathleen de la Peña McCook
Distinguished University Professor
School of Information
University of South Florida
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