I wasn't really interested in doing cartoons at that time, but I had one teacher, Miss McCoy, who used to call me and the other Black pupil in the sc… - Ollie Harrington

Black Renaissance can come only from Black people, by Black people, of Black people, and for Black people.

...since V-J Day more than nine Negro veterans have been lynched and not one of the lynchers brought to justice…In every field of crime, though some escape, criminals are caught–every crime but one. For the crime of race hate and lynching there has never been a conviction in the history of the United States…To me, a layman, an agency committed to defending the lives of its citizens should spend less time finding legal reasons for not acting, and more time acting on behalf of human justice.

About the time I was 17 and graduated from high school, I went to Harlem, and that was a most beautiful place where, fortunately for me, I came into, or rather, ran into, the hands of some wonderful people, people who formed an important part of the so-called Black Renaissance. They were people like Langston Hughes, Wally Thurmond, Bud Fisher, all really wonderful writers. I lived in the YMCA where you could rent a room for $2 a week and they put all the regular inhabitants up on the 11th floor. Among them were people like Charlie Drew, who became the developer of blood plasma, distinguished physicians, physics people, and biologists. Now, this was a wonderful experience for me.