‘Alabama Types’ Exhibit to feature typewriter of Demopolis native, UF Professor Emeritus James Haskins

Demopolis native James Haskins saw the absence of children’s books on black historical figures. Filling that lack, he became one of America’s most published children’s book authors with more than 100 works of nonfiction to his credit.

When Haskins died in 2005, he was an English professor at the University of Florida. The school has agreed to loan his typewriter for exhibition with others on display in the University of Alabama Gallery.

In advance of the university exhibit, the Haskins typewriter will be displayed in the Demopolis Public Library Oct. 18-25.

Arranged by the Southern Literary Trail based at Mississippi State University in Starkville, a collection of typewriters once owned by notable writers is on a traveling exhibition through the South.

“Alabama Types” is sponsored in Tuscaloosa with the support of the University’s departments of English and Theatre and Dance within the College of Arts and Sciences. The exhibit in Tuscaloosa will be Nov. 2-Dec. 2.

Haskins one recalled that he “stumbled into writing” while teaching a special needs class of 10-year-olds in New York in 1967. His early career in teaching led to his book “Diary of a Harlem Schoolteacher” that compelled reform of the city’s public schools with African-American enrollments.

His subsequent biographical books include those on Rosa Parks, Dinah Washington, Richard Pryor, Hank Aaron and Scott Joplin. Haskins’ book about the famous Cotton Club nightclub served as a resource for the 1984 movie “The Cotton Club” directed by Francis Ford Coppola.

For more information about the Haskins exhibit in Demopolis, call 334-289-1595. Information on the Tuscaloosa exhibit is available by calling 205-348-9950 or visiting “Alabama Types” on Facebook. Both exhibits are free to the public.