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Beatrice Murphy Campbell (1908 – May 12, 1992), also known by her pen name Beatrice M. Murphy, was a poet, public servant, and advocate.

a. Leonard Hughes

b. obit

c. The Concise Oxford Companion to African American Literature

d. Encyclopedia of African American Women Writers

Early Life
a. Beatrice Murphy was born in Monesson, Pennylvania before moving to Washington, DC at the age of 7.

a. Graduated from Dunbar High School in 1928.

Public Service
a. Wrote D.C.'s first health plan and its first nursing home regulations.

b. Was kicked out because of suspected communist ties, but was acquitted.

Writer, Poet and Literary Collector
c. Early in her career, Murphy served as a columnist and editor at the Washington Tribune.

c. In 1938, she became a book review editor for the Afro-American.

c. Published three books of her own poetry. One of Murphy's major works was Love Is a Terrible Thing (1945). While her poetry tended to be traditional in form, she employed vivid metaphors in some of her more striking pieces.

c. However, Murphy's most critical contribution to literature may have been as an editor of four poetry anthologies. Murphy's primary goal in these publications was to provide greater audience to young unknown writer, such as college students and working amateurs.

c. Murphy continued her collection and publication of Black literature later in her career by founding the Minority Research Center in 1965. As the editor of its journal, Bibliographic Survey: The Negro in Print, Murphy published seven volumes of literature between 1965 and 1972.

a. When the center closed in 1977, Murphy donated its 3,000 books to the District of Columbia's library system. Most of her collection currently lives in the Black Studies Collection at the Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial Library.