Finding Aid for Black Panther Party - F.B.I. File

• Descriptive Summary
• Historical Note
• Scope and Content Note
• Container List

Source

Received from Paul L. Loewenwarter - CBS News in 1983.

Access

Collection is open to the public. Advance notice required.

Restrictions on Use

For permission to publish, contact the Curator, Manuscripts, Archives and Rare Books Division.

Preferred Citation

Black Panther Party - F.B.I. Files, Sc MG 81. Manuscripts, Archives and Rare Books Division, The New York Public Library, Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture.

The Black Panther Party was founded in Oakland, California in 1966 by Huey P. Newton and Bobby Seale. The philosophy of the Black Panthers, known as their ten-point program, combined Marxist socialism and black nationalism with demands for land, housing, education, justice and peace. By 1969 the Black Panthers had become known nationally.

The collection consists of photocopies of printed material obtained by CBS News through the Freedom of Information Act from the FBI File on the Black Panther Party. The folder headings and content are identical to those of the original CBS envelopes which have been discarded.

The Black Panther Party. FBI File Collection contains files about organizing black student unions, transcripts for two movies produced by the Black Panther Party, a coloring book with captions, party propaganda, news clippings about the party, printed material on explosives, and booklets on riots distributed in ghetto areas. Additionally, there are speeches by Eldridge Cleaver and Stokley Carmichael, news clippings and other printed matter about the breakfast for children program and liberation schools, and black nationalist anti-Semitism. An organizational chart and rules of the Party can also be found. A file of speeches by William C. Sullivan, FBI director about revolutionary extremism, communism and African Americans, and civil disorder and academic communities completes this collection.