Center for Black Music Research
Personal papers and manuscr... Alton Augustus Adams papers Finding Aid, or Guide to the CollectionBy Flandreau, Suzanne
Title: Alton Augustus Adams papers, 1915–1985
Predominant Dates:1920–1979
ID: 1000/ADAMA_1016
Primary Creator: Adams, Alton A.
Extent: 18.0 Linear Feet. More info below.
Arrangement: The collection was received in several installments, with little original order intact. Correspondence is in chronological order where possible, the unfinished autobiography is sorted by chapter, and the remaining materials simply organized in series by activity and function.
Date Acquired: 00/00/1994
Subjects: Composers, Black, Hotel Association of the Virgin Islands (US), Journalism, Military bands, Musicians, Black, Press Associations, Radio programs, Saint Thomas (United States Virgin Islands)
Languages: English
The personal papers of Alton Augustus Adams, Senior, reflect his activities as the first black bandmaster in the US Navy (1917–1934 and 1942–1947), as a press correspondent (1949–circa 1968), as a member and president of the Hotel Association of the Virgin Islands (1952–1970), and as a lifelong educator, civic leader, author, and local historian. They also contain manuscripts of his music compositions, band parts, and music by other composers performed by his band or inscribed to him. In his extensive correspondence, there are letters from major American bandmasters, including John Philip Sousa and Edwin Franko Goldman, and correspondence with Richard Franko Goldman, whose band often performed Adams’s marches.
In 1924, the Navy Band of the Virgin Islands made a successful tour of the eastern U.S. mainland—a scrapbook in Series VII records the events of that tour and the overwhelmingly favorable public reaction. The band continued to be a showpiece in the region into the 1930s. Band activities are also documented in three general scrapbooks, in Adams’s autobiographical memoirs, and in other fragmentary materials in Series VII.
Many of Adams’s musical compositions were destroyed in a fire in 1933, but a number of scores and parts survive, including his three published marches and other concert pieces, either scored for piano, band, or orchestra. There are also arrangements (usually parts only) for other pieces played by the band, from standards such as “Oh Promise Me” and “Tales from the Vienna Woods” to pieces by Latin-American composers possibly arranged for band by Adams himself. Musical works by Adams and others are together in Series VIII.
The correspondence of Alton A. Adams, originally preserved in three loose-leaf letterbooks as well as left loose in his files, dates from 1915 to 1985. Incoming correspondence includes letters relating to his military career, letters from several musicians and composers, including Eva Jessye, Clarence Cameron White, Philippa Duke Schuyler, and William L. Dawson, and letters from other important figures, among them Claude Barnett, George Schuyler, and Carter G. Woodson. Several governors of the Virgin Islands are also represented. Many other letters are from individuals who were guests at his guesthouse, which he ran on St. Thomas after his retirement from the Navy in 1947. A few carbons of Adams’s outgoing letters also survive. Correspondence is collected and filed chronologically in Series II. There is a separate name index to Series II available.
Materials from the period that Adams served as supervisor of music education for the public schools include sporadic correspondence, speeches, and writings that reflect his educational service, but there are no formal records of this aspect of his career in the collection.
Records of the Hotel Association of the Virgin Islands, including correspondence, minutes and memos, make up Series IV. Adams was a founding member of the Association. These are present especially for its early years, when the hotelkeepers successfully fought a 2% hotel tax and attempted to develop a vocational training system for hotel workers. Records of other areas of public service in which Adams engaged are present in Series V but are less complete.
During the 1950s and 1960s, Adams was a journalist and correspondent. His employers included the Pittsburgh Courier, the Associated Negro Press, and the Associated Press. His stories and press wires with correspondence concerning them are in Series III. Unfortunately, many are undated, but the stories are arranged chronologically when possible. Adams was also a member of the Virgin Islands Press Association, and limited records from the early years of that organization are contained in Series III as well.
For a number of years, Alton Adams hosted a radio broadcast sponsored by the Hotel Association. His radio scripts, in the form of undated handwritten drafts, are in Series VII. Adams also gave speeches over the radio and in person, wrote articles in the local newspaper, and wrote on musical subjects for a larger audience. Many of these speeches and writings survive in typescript form and can be found in Series VI. Unfortunately, records of his early contributions to band literature, including regular articles for Jacob’s Band Monthly and other publications, were lost when his house burned in 1933. Assignments for a writing course he took in 1953–1954, apparently when he was contemplating becoming a press correspondent, are in Series VI. There is also a completed but unpublished typescript on arranging music for band.
Series VII contains information about Adams’s other musical activities, including performances of his marches by the Goldman Band, and the adoption of his “Virgin Islands March” as the national song of the U.S. Virgin Islands in 1963. There are several folders of materials relating to composer/performer Philippa Duke Schuyler, who gave several performances in St. Thomas.
An interesting and important part of the papers is Adams’s autobiography, which he left in semi-finished form and in many versions. Series I contains both the typescript of the autobiography and other fragmentary versions and biographical materials. These have been edited by Mark Clague and published in the CBMR's Music of the African Diaspora series as The Memoirs of Alton Augustus Adams, Sr.: First Black Bandmaster of the United States Navy (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2008).
Alton Augustus Adams Sr. was born in St. Thomas, Virgin Islands in 1889 and died there in 1987. He studied music by correspondence, earning a Bachelor of Music degree, and founded the St. Thomas Juvenile Band in 1910. When the United States assumed territorial administration of the Virgin Islands from Denmark in 1917, the band was inducted into the U.S. Navy as a goodwill gesture. Adams made a name for himself as the first black bandmaster in the U.S. Navy and as a writer on band-related topics.
Adams continued to conduct bands for the U.S. Navy through World War II. In 1942 in Guantánamo, Cuba, he led a Navy band that was the first racially integrated band in the U.S. armed forces. Adams was also a composer; his published compositions include three marches: "The Governor's Own," "The Spirit of the U.S. Navy," and "The Virgin Islands March," which became the "national anthem" of the U.S. Virgin Islands.
In addition to conducting and composing, Adams was a journalist, writer, radio broadcaster, and educator, and was considered an important person in St. Thomas, its "First Citizen." He played a strong civic role through the various organizations with which he was associated. From 1918 to 1931 he supervised the music programs in the public schools of the Virgin Islands. After his retirement from the Navy in 1947, Adams worked as a press correspondent for several media organizations, produced a radio program featuring classical music, and was active for many years in the tourism industry, including running his own guest house in St. Thomas. Notably, he was a founding member of the Hotel Association of the Virgin Islands, and served as its president from 1952 to 1970.
Composers, Black
Hotel Association of the Virgin Islands (US)
Journalism
Military bands
Musicians, Black
Press Associations
Radio programs
Saint Thomas (United States Virgin Islands)
Repository: Center for Black Music Research
Alternate Extent Statement: 18 linear feet (20 boxes, with 3 volumes and sound recordings on 7" reels and audiocassette tape).
Access Restrictions: None; some of the materials are quite fragile and need special care in handling.
Use Restrictions: None
Physical Access Note: Includes 2 large photographs, reel-to-reel tapes (7 in.), cassettes
Acquisition Source: Adams, Alton A., Jr.
Acquisition Method: Boxed and shipped from materials stored in creator's office on St. Thomas, US Virgin Islands.
Separated Materials: Photographs
Related Publications: Clague, Mark, editor. The Memoirs of Alton Augustus Adams, Sr.: First Black Bandmaster of the United States Navy. Berkeley: University of California Press, 2008. CBMR’s Music of the African Diaspora.
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