Bobby Seale and the Black Panther Party in the Archives

Bobby Seale, one of the founders of the Black Panther Party, will visit UMD on February 1st, 2018 as part of the Arts and Humanities “2017-2018 Dean’s Lecture Series: Courageous Conversations”. Seale’s visit prompted us at Special Collections and University Archives to look in our collections for information on Seale and the Black Panther Party.

Student newspapers such as the Diamondback and The Eclipse tell us that Seale spoke at UMD in Ritchie Coliseum in 1972 and in Hoff Theater in 1995. Seale also spoke at the STamp Studnet Union in 1974.

The History of the University of Maryland – Campus Unrest collection contains documents about the Black Panther Party, such as the Party’s platform and a flier encouraging students to protest the imprisonment of Bobby Seale and other Party members.

Bobby Seale and the Black Panther Party are also mentioned in the Radical Guide to the University of Maryland (see p. 14) where the Democratic Radical Union of Maryland (D.R.U.M) states that their first demand is the end of “political repression of Black people and of the Black Panther Party”.

The Black Panther Party’s newspaper, “The Black Panther” is available to UMD students through the UMD Library’s online subscription to the database Black Thought and Culture.