The Collection

Berry0162sTheodore “Ted” Berry (1905-2000) was the first African American mayor in Cincinnati, served the Lyndon Baines Johnson presidential administration in civil rights programs, and was an active attorney for the NAACP.

Three decades ago, Berry donated his papers to the University of Cincinnati where they are housed in the Archives and Rare Books Library.

Over the years his children have generously added to those materials. Documenting both his personal life and his public career, these papers have been used in various research endeavors, but they had never been sufficiently processed to reveal the full extent of their importance.

In 2010, the University of Cincinnati Libraries received a grant from the National Historical Publications and Records Commission of the National Archives to fully process Theodore Berry’s papers and to create modern finding aids. For the first time, these significant materials would be readily available to scholars, journalists, teachers, and students.

The project to process his papers is now complete and the Theodore
Berry Papers are available for use in the Archives and Rare Books
Library.