{{short description|American journalist}} {{Infobox person |name = Era Bell Thompson |image = Era Bell Thompson (13270027285).jpg |caption = Portrait of Era Bell Thompson from the collection of Black Women Oral History Project. |birth_name = Era Bell Thompson |birth_date = {{Birth date|1905|08|10}} |birth_place =Des Moines, Iowa |death_date = {{Death date and age|1986|12|30|1905|08|10}}<ref>{{cite news|url=https://www.nytimes.com/1987/01/03/obituaries/era-bell-thompson-80-dies-novelist-and-editor-at-ebony.html|title=Era Bell Thompson, 80, Dies; Novelist and Editor at Ebony|work=The New York Times|date=3 January 1987|page=8|access-date= September 3, 2020}}</ref> |death_place = Chicago, Illinois |alma_mater = Morningside College |occupation = Writer, editor |awards = Roughrider Award }}
'''Era Bell Thompson''' (August 10, 1905 – December 30, 1986) was an American writer and editor.
Thompson was born in Des Moines, Iowa,<ref name="amcrom">{{cite book|last=Cromwell|first=Adelaide M.|author-link=Adelaide M. Cromwell|title=Apropos of Africa: sentiments of Negro American leaders on Africa from the 1800s to the 1950s|year=1969|publisher=Routledge|isbn=0-7146-1757-1|author2=Adélaïde Cromwell Hill|author3=Martin Kilson|author-link3=Martin Luther Kilson|page=[https://archive.org/details/aproposofafricas0000crom/page/272 272]|url=https://archive.org/details/aproposofafricas0000crom/page/272}} Includes brief bio and a selection from ''Africa''.</ref> to an African American family, the only daughter of Steward "Tony" Thompson and Mary Logan Thompson, the children of formerly enslaved people. She graduated from the University of North Dakota (UND), pursued a career as an author, and was a long-time editor and journalist for ''Ebony'' magazine in Chicago.
Thompson was a recipient of the governor of North Dakota's Roughrider Award, and a multicultural center at UND is named for her.
==Early years== In 1914, her parents moved Thompson and her three brothers to Driscoll, North Dakota, where they were the only black family in the small community, and she and her brothers were often the only African-Americans in the schools they attended. Thompson would find herself in similar situations for much of her youth and into early adulthood. She wrote years later of her ignorance of blacks before she moved to Chicago following her graduation from college.<ref>Broussard, J., & Cooley, Skye (2009). ''Ebony's Era Bell Thompson Travels the World to Tell the True Story.'' American Journalism. accepted for publication.</ref>
Thompson graduated from Bismarck High, where she had excelled in sports and pursued journalism, often to cope with the isolation she often felt. She enrolled at the University of North Dakota in 1925, and she excelled in track and field, breaking several school records, tying two national records, and earning the distinction of being one of the state's greatest athletes.<ref name="mhbp"/> However, during her second year of college, an extended bout with pleurisy left her too debilitated to run track and forced her to leave school.
She moved to Chicago and worked in a variety of short-lived clerical jobs before landing one at a magazine. For three months and for a pay of ten dollars a week, she "learned how to run a magazine on hope, patience, and a very worn shoe string; to proofread and write advertising copy—and keep warm by burning magazines in an old fireplace," Thompson writes in her autobiography. After an illness to her father she was forced to return to North Dakota, where she worked for the Rev. Robert O'Brian family<ref>Thompson, Era Bell. "Blacks Who Grew Up in White Homes", ''Ebony Magazine'', June 1974, p. 94.</ref> doing chores in exchange for financial support for her and her family.
==Literary career== She returned to college with the support of the Rev. Robert O'Brian family and received a B.A. degree from Morningside College in Sioux City, Iowa. Returning to Chicago, she did postgraduate work at Northwestern University's Medill School of Journalism.<ref name="amcrom"/><ref name="mhbp">{{cite web|last=Helm|first=Matt|title=Thompson, Era Bell (1906–1986)|date=16 December 2007|url=http://www.blackpast.org/?q=aaw/thompson-era-bell-1906-1986|publisher=BlackPast.org}}</ref> Initially unable to find a job in journalism, Thompson worked a number of small clerical jobs while continuing to write small personal writing projects and, thanks in part to a fellowship from Newberry Library,<ref name="amcrom"/> an autobiography. Published in 1946, it is entitled ''American Daughter''.<ref>Thompson, E. B. (1974, paperback edition) ''American Daughter.'' The University of Chicago Press. 296.</ref><ref>{{cite book|last=Guzman|first=Richard|title=Black Writing from Chicago: in the world, not of it?|year=2006|publisher=SIU Press |isbn=0-8093-2704-X|pages=60–65}} Includes brief bio & selection from ''American Daughter''.</ref>
In 1947, Thompson came to the attention of Johnson Publishing Company publisher of ''Negro Digest'' and ''Ebony''. After a stint writing for the ''Digest'', she joined ''Ebony'' magazine as associate editor. Two years after becoming co-managing editor, she began her foreign reporting in 1953. She was instrumental in shaping ''Ebony'' magazine's vision and guiding its coverage for approximately forty years while serving in a variety of editorial capacities.
In 1954, she published a second book, ''Africa, Land of My Fathers'',<ref>{{cite book|last=Thompson|first=Era Bell|title=Africa, Land of My Fathers|year=1954|publisher=Doubleday|pages=281}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|last=Annonces|first=Vielles|title=New Book by Era Bell Thompson |magazine= Jet Magazine|date= September 30, 1954|url=https://www.flickr.com/photos/11412072@N06/3685122699|access-date=July 7, 2010}} Image of book review</ref> based on a tour of 18 countries in Africa. Thompson was still listed as an editor of ''Ebony'' in 1985, an indication of her longevity with the publication. She was praised for her efforts in promoting both racial and gender understanding. She died in Chicago on December 30, 1986.<ref>Broussard, J., & Cooley, Skye (2009), "Ebony's Era Bell Thompson Travels the World to Tell the True Story". American Journalism. accepted for publication. Thompson was a member of Sigma Gamma Rho sorority.</ref>
In 2020, Thompson was inducted into the Chicago Literary Hall of Fame.<ref>{{Cite web |date=2020 |title=Era Bell Thompson: Chicago Literary Hall of Fame Winner |url=https://chicagoliteraryhof.org/inductees/profile/era-bell-thompson |access-date=2022-09-10 |website=Chicago Literary Hall of Fame}}</ref>
==Bibliography== *Thompson, Era Bell (1946). ''[http://www.worldcat.org/oclc/950053703 American Daughter]'' (Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 119. *Thompson, Era Bell (1954). ''[http://www.worldcat.org/oclc/526168 Africa: Land of My Fathers]''. (Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday). *{{cite book|last1=Thompson|first1=Era Bell|last2=Nipson|first2=Herbert|title=White on black; the views of twenty-two white Americans on the Negro. Edited by Era Bell Thompson and Herbert Nipson, editors of Ebony magazine.|date=1963|publisher=Johnson Publishing Co.|location=Chicago |oclc=910396067}} *{{cite journal|last1=Thompson|first1=Era Bell|title=Surinam: Multicultural Paradise at the Crossroads|journal=Ebony|date=1967|volume=12|issue=4|page=112+|oclc=775274807}} *{{cite journal|last1=Thompson|first1=Era Bell|title=Negro Publications and the Writer|journal=Phylon|date=1950|volume=11|issue=4|pages=304–306|doi=10.2307/272358|jstor=272358}} *{{cite journal|last1=Thompson|first1=Era Bell|title=Australia: Its White Policy and the Negro|journal=Ebony|date=July 1966|pages=46–56|oclc=953916009}}
== References == {{Reflist|30em}}
==Further reading== *{{cite web|last1=Thompson|first1=Era Bell|title=Thompson, Era Bell|url=http://www.anb.org/articles/16/16-02405.html?a=1&n=thompson%20era%20bell&d=10&ss=0&q=1|website=American National Biography Online|publisher=Oxford University Press|access-date=March 25, 2017}}
==External links== *[https://web.archive.org/web/20051118234247/http://www.aaregistry.com/african_american_history/1064/Era_Thompson_helped_shape_Ebony_magazine Biography at African American Registry website] * [https://web.archive.org/web/20101023121147/http://www.readnd.org/Thompson_Era.aspx Read North Dakota, '' Era Bell Thompson Biography''] * {{cite web|title=Era Bell Thompson (1905-1986)|url=http://www.mandanhistory.org/biographieslz/erabellthompson.html|publisher=MANDAN Historical Society|access-date= July 7, 2010}}
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Thompson, Era Bell}} Category:African-American women journalists Category:African-American journalists Category:1905 births Category:1986 deaths Category:People from Grand Forks, North Dakota Category:Morningside University alumni Category:Medill School of Journalism alumni Category:Writers from North Dakota Category:African-American media personalities Category:20th-century American women journalists Category:20th-century American women writers Category:20th-century American non-fiction writers Category:Journalists from North Dakota Category:20th-century American journalists Category:20th-century African-American women writers Category:20th-century African-American writers Category:African Americans in North Dakota Category:African-American history of North Dakota Category:North Dakota Fighting Hawks women's track and field athletes