Dr. Gordon Blaine Hancock (1884-1970)

Gordon B. Hancock, born to formerly enslaved parents, was a leader in the struggle for racial equality in the decades before the Civil Rights Movement. A Harvard-educated sociologist, he taught at Virginia Union University for more than 30 years. In frequent speeches and in a weekly column published in more than 100 Black newspapers, he promoted Black economic solidarity and self-help. In 1942 he helped organize and was director of a conference of Southern Black leaders that issued the Durham Manifesto, a call for interracial cooperation to achieve social reforms and end racial injustice. Hancock was pastor of Moore Street Baptist Church in Richmond from 1925 to 1963.

Department of Historic Resources, 2022