Vera Lee and Berry Clanton papers

A collection of 31 souvenir programs, plus approximately 50 ephemeral items, 12 periodical issues, six books, and three folders of Masonic Lodge records and documents.

The majority of the items date from the 1960s and 1970s. The Clantons were prominent members of the San Francisco African American community, active in their local church (Third Baptist) as well as in the National Baptist Convention, their local African American masonic lodges (at the local, district, and state level), the NAACP, the National Council of Negro Women, National Association of Negro Business and Professional Women's Clubs. These programs, ephemera and documents represent their participation in all of these groups at the local, state and national levels. The programs document a wide-ranging variety of events including fashion shows, music and dance shows, church events, memorials, commemorative banquets, political events, and more. There are also four Masonic event programs in the collection, together with Masonic ephemera, periodicals, and records. A small group of booklets and ephemera relate to Third Baptist Church in San Francisco. Finally, the collection includes a collection of African American Baptist ephemera, including roughly 30 mailed fundraising items published by the Foreign Mission Board of the National Baptist Convention, soliciting donations to help support impoverished people in Africa and the Caribbean. Prince Hall Freemason newsletters included.