In 1919, the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) dubbed "Lift Every Voice and Sing" the "Negro national anthem", for its power in voicing a cry for liberation and affirmation for African American people. Like other temporary installations, the sculpture was destroyed at the close of the fair. Savage was the only Black woman commissioned for the Fair, and the sculpture (which was retitled "The Harp" by organizers) was also sold as miniature replicas and on postcards during the event. The 1939 New York World's Fair, taking the form of choir of children shaped into a harp. Within twenty years it was being sung over the South and in some other parts of the country." Recognition Ī sculpture by Augusta Savage named after the song was exhibited at In the years that followed, "Lift Every Voice and Sing" was sung within Black communities Johnson wrote that "the school children of Jacksonville kept singing it they went off to other schools and sang it they became teachers and taught it to other children. Īfter the Great Fire of 1901, the Johnsons moved to New York City to pursue a career on Broadway. Rosamond Johnson would later set the poem to music. "Lift Every Voice and Sing" was first recited by a group of 500 students in 1900. However, amid the ongoing civil rights movement Johnson decided to write a poem which was themed around the struggles of African Americans following the Reconstruction era (including the passage of Jim Crow laws in the South). Stanton School in Jacksonville, Florida, had sought to write a poem in commemoration of Abraham Lincoln's birthday. James Weldon Johnson–principal of the segregated Edwin M. 3.1 Prominence since the George Floyd protests.