Florence Curtis
*Florence Curtis was born on September 30, 1873. She was a white-American library educator and teacher.
Florence Rising Curtis was born in Ogdensburg, New York. Her father was General Newton Martin Curtis, and her mother was Emeline Clark Curtis. She attended Wells College from 1891 to 1894 and, in 1898, received a diploma from the New York State Library School. Curtis held positions at several libraries from 1895 to 1908, and in 1908 became an assistant professor at the University of Illinois at Urbana–Champaign. Curtis served there until 1920 and received an M.A. from the University of Minnesota in 1917.
After 1920, Curtis worked overseas as an instructor at the government preparatory school and the Honan Agricultural College in Kaifeng, China, from 1920 to 1921, and then served at the Philippine Normal School in Manila from 1921 to 1922. Upon returning to the United States, Curtis took a position as director of the Drexel Institute Library School. Curtis was named director of the new Hampton Institute Library School in 1925.
The Carnegie Corporation of New York founded the school to provide African Americans with training in librarianship. During her directorship, Curtis influenced over 150 students and assisted in the regional accreditation of many schools for African Americans, particularly in the southern United States. Curtis was a member of the Virginia Library Association and the National Association of Teachers in Colored Schools. Curtis was also a member of the American Library Association.
Curtis served as director of Hampton Institute until 1939, when it closed due to a lack of funding. Florence Rising Curtis, a champion of education and training for Asian and African American library students through her work overseas and with the Hampton Institute Library School, died on October 6, 1944, in Richmond, Virginia.
