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Yarbrough family papers, 1913-2000

Overview of the Collection

Creator
Yarbrough, Arline J., 1912-
Title
Yarbrough family papers
Dates
1913-2000 (inclusive)
Quantity
2.26 cu. ft. (4 boxes)
1 sound cassette (ca. 90 min.)
Collection Number
5263 (Accession No. 5263-001)
Summary
Personal papers of an African American businesswoman, civil servant and clubwoman
Repository
University of Washington Libraries, Special Collections
Special Collections
University of Washington Libraries
Box 352900
Seattle, WA
98195-2900
Telephone: 2065431929
Fax: 2065431931
speccoll@uw.edu
Access Restrictions

Open to all users.

Request at UW

Languages
English
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Biographical Note

African American businesswoman, civil servant, club woman. Arline Steward Yarbrough (1912-1999), a Colorado native, came to Seattle from Salt Lake City with her family in 1928, married Letcher Yarbrough in 1932, ran a stenography and mimeograph business ca 1949-1951, and worked as a secretary for several state agencies including the UW School of Social Work. She was among the early black staff members at UW, working for Charles Brink, who was then the Dean of the School of Social Work. Before she went into secretarial work full time, she and her husband were active in Christian Friends for Racial Equality, which was trying to abolish discrimination in cemeteries. She persuaded owners of Sunset Hills to allow burials of blacks. In 1950 the Yarbroughs were an early black family who moved to suburban Kirkland. Active in numerous clubs and civic organizations, Arline joined the Business and Professional Women's Club of Kirkland, served as its president 1967-1968 and was named its Woman of the Year in 1984. She was featured in the former Radcliffe College "Women of Courage" Black Women Oral History Project of 1976. She founded Relatives of Old-Timers (ROOTS), a reunion of blacks who lived in Washington before World War II, and she also was a founder of the Black Heritage Society. She also was active in the King County Landmarks Commission, the National Council of Negro Women and the Seattle Central Area Senior Center, of which she was a past president.

Letcher L. Yarbrough came to Seattle in 1912, and after high school and one year at the UW, he worked at various jobs, then served in the Army. He then worked for the U.S. General Services Division for 31 years and was active in civil rights associations and civic groups in Seattle and Kirkland. Letcher experienced racism firsthand in the army, and, after he was discharged in 1944, he worked on assisting returning veterans in securing housing and employment. He was president of the Seattle branch of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People in the mid-1940s and later state president. With others, he helped pass the Washington State Fair Employment Practices Act of 1949. Mr. Yarbrough was active in many civil/human rights organizations and committees, including the National Conference of Christians and Jews, Seattle Army Terminal Standing Grievance Committee, Christian Friends for Racial Equality and The Urban League. He was a mayoral appointee to the Seattle Civic Unity Committee. He went to work as assistant director for the Seattle Urban League in 1976 after retiring as Regional Equal Employment Official for General Services Administration in Auburn. In later years, he worked in commercial real estate. Letcher and Arline were married for 59 years, and he died in 1992.

Their son Jim (Letcher S.) graduated from high school in Kirkland and from Central Washington University. His career was spent as a recreation director in Alaska and in Seattle for the federal government; he then served as Deputy Executive Secretary of the Washington Centennial Commission, 1987-1990.

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Content Description

Personal documents, oral history interviews, photographs, scrapbook, clippings, awards, related memorabilia of Yarborough Family, especially Arline Yarbrough; ca 1913-ca 2000. Includes scrapbook of Arline Yarbrough's presidency of Business and Professional Women, Kirkland (1968) and printing samples from the lettershop (1949-1951). Also includes assorted photographs of family members and of others whose association with the Yarbroughs in unclear.

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Use of the Collection

Restrictions on Use

Creator's literary rights transferred to the University of Washington Libraries.

Some restrictions exist on copying, quotation or publication. Contact Repository for details.

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Administrative Information

Acquisition Information

Donated by James Yarbrough, 6/22/2000

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Detailed Description of the Collection

 

  • Description: Bio Features: Arline Yarbrough
    Dates: 1984-1999
    Container: 1
  • Description: Arline - Writings
    Dates: 1964-1985
    Container: 1
  • Description: Tributes - Arline
    Dates: 1977-1999
    Container: 1
  • Description: Printing Sample - Yarbrough's Letter Shop
    Dates: undated
    Container: 1
  • Description: Arline - Retirement Message, UW Retirement
    Dates: 1972
    Container: 1
  • Description: ROOTS Reunion Program, etc. with Seattle/Tacoma Black Family Histories
    Dates: 1982
    Container: 1
  • Description: Museum
    Dates: 1977-1988
    Container: 1
  • Description: Photos - Arline; Membership Certificate
    Dates: undated; 1983
    Container: 1
  • Description: UW Human Rights Commission
    Dates: 1970
    Container: 1
  • Description: Will - Arline
    Dates: 1977
    Container: 1
  • Description: Clipping - Re Arline
    Dates: 1971, 1985
    Container: 1
  • Description: Interview Tape - Arline
    Dates: 1985
    Container: 1
  • Description: Black Women Oral History Project: Interview with Arline J. Yarbrough

    Bound volume of Marcia Greenlee's interview with Arline Yarbrough, published by Radcliffe College. The Schlesinger Library of Radcliffe College began a project in 1976 with support from the Rockefeller Foundation and the Blanchard Foundation to record and transcribe the autobiographical memoirs of a group of black American women 60 years of age and older. "The purpose of the project is to develop a body of resources on the live of black women in the twentieth century, especially in the years prior to the Civil Rights Movement, and to make this material available to researchers and students interested in the struggles of women and racial minorities in the United States."

    Dates: August 3, 1977
    Container: 1
  • Description: Publications with Family Background
    Dates: 1976-1996
    Container: 1
  • Description: Arline Yarborough - For Personal Scrapbook
    Dates: 1970-1983
    Container: 1
  • Description: Arline Yarborough (Data) - Misc, Correspondence, Personal
    Dates: 1957-1993
    Container: 1
  • Description: Letcher - Bio
    Dates: 1967-1992
    Container: 2
  • Description: Letcher - Letters
    Dates: 1977
    Container: 2
  • Description: Letcher - Bio
    Dates: 1967-1992
    Container: 2
  • Description: Letcher - Photos and Memorabilia
    Dates: 1946-1992
    Container: 2
  • Description: Letcher Yarbrough - Photographs and Certificates
    Dates: 1941-1962, photos undated
    Container: 2
  • Description: Letcher - Certificates
    Dates: 1956-1992
    Container: 2
  • Description: Sup. Training Class
    Dates: 1951
    Container: 2
  • Description: Miscellaneous

    Clippings, articles, writings, publications, and charcoal drawing of a young Letcher

    Dates: 1967-1988
    Container: 2
  • Description: Arline and Letcher - Photos
    Dates: 1960-2000
    Container: 2
  • Description: Travel Postcards and Photos
    Dates: 1975
    Container: 2
  • Description: Clippings, Memorabilia
    Dates: 1934-1988
    Container: 2
  • Description: Financial, Property, and Legal Documents: Searle, Juanita, Burton, King - Seafirst National
    Dates: 1963-1968
    Container: 2
  • Description: Jim - Resume
    Dates: 1990
    Container: 2
  • Description: Letters - Jim to Mothers, Arline
    Dates: 1956-1957
    Container: 2
  • Description: Jim - Letters and Writing
    Dates: 1963-2000
    Container: 2
  • Description: Photos - Grandchildren, Misc.
    Dates: 1981-1990
    Container: 2
  • Description: Photos - Misc.
    Dates: undated
    Container: 2
  • Description: Photos - Unidentified or Unclear What Relation to Yarbroughs
    Dates: 1967-1992
    Container: 2
  • Description: Photos - Misc, Unidentified
    Dates: undated
    Container: 2
  • Description: Misc. Correspondence - Extended Family or Friends?
    Dates: undated
    Container: 2
  • Description: Photographs
    Dates: undated
    Container: 3
  • Description: Bound copy of "To Secure These Rights: The Report of the President's Committee on Civil Rights"
    Dates: 1947
    Container: 3
  • Description: Reports and Correspondence
    Dates: 1946-1988
    Container: 3
  • Description: Clippings
    Dates: 1922-1972
    Container: 3
  • Description: Gypsies
    Dates: 1962
    Container: 3
  • Description: Clippings
    Dates: 1942-1999
    Container: 3
  • Description: Subject Series: NW Black Pioneers
    Dates: 1987-1988
    Container: 3
  • Description: Broadway High School "Sealth" Yearbook
    Dates: 1913
    Container: 3
  • Description: Awards
    Dates: 1976-1981
    Container: 3
  • Description: Medals, Badges
    Dates: undated
    Container: 3
  • Description: Miscellaneous Ephemera

    Magazine, invitations, photographs, correspondence, writings, pamphlets, a 42 star American flag

    Dates: 1981
    Container: 3
  • Description: Unidentified Photographs
    Dates: undated
    Container: 4
  • Description: Unidentified Photograph
    Dates: undated
    Container: 4
  • Description: Ephemera: Plaques
    Dates: 1962, 1979
    Container: 4
  • Description: Ephemera: Tourist Souvenir Plates
    Dates: undated
    Container: 4
  • Description: Printing Samples
    Dates: 1949-1951
    Container: 4
  • Description: Arline Yarborough, President of the Kirkland Club of Business and Professional Women - Scrapbook
    Dates: 1968
    Container: 4


2007 (Last modified: 4/19/2018)

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