PREFACE

This study was begun as one of the several researches
of the Bureau of Social Research of the New York School
of Philanthropy, largely at the suggestion of Dr. Samuel
McCune Lindsay, the director, to whose interest, advice
and sympathy its completion is largely due. Sincere thanks
are due the Bureau for making the investigation possible.

The material was gathered between January, 1909, and
January, 1910, except about four weeks in August, 1909,
during the time that I was pursuing studies at the School
of Philanthropy and at Columbia University.

The investigation necessarily involved many questions
concerning the personal affairs of many Negroes of New
York and it is a pleasant duty to acknowledge the unvary¬
ing cheerfulness with which they rendered assistance in se¬
curing the facts.

I wish to acknowledge especially the help of Dr. William
L. Bulkley in making possible many of the interviews with
wage-earners, of Dr. Roswell C. McCrea for criticism and
encouragement in preparation of the monograph, and of
Dr. E. E. Pratt, sometime fellow of the Bureau of Social
Research; Miss Dora Sandowsky for her careful and pains¬
taking tabulation of most of the figures. They should not
be charged, however, with responsibility for any of the
errors that may be detected by the trained eye.

The study as now published is incomplete. Part I, the
Negro as a Wage-earner and Part II, the Negro in Busi¬
ness, were to be supplemented by Part III, the Negro in the
Professions. But the time absorbed in gathering the ma-
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