James Haskins, 63; Prolific Author on Black History

James Haskins, who wrote more than 100 books about key moments in African American history and the black politicians, social reformers, artists and athletes who rose to prominence along the way, has died. He was 63.

Haskins, who aimed most of his books at young readers, died June 6 at his home in New York City of complications from emphysema, according to Irma McClaurin, a friend and colleague.

He began his career as a teacher in the New York City public school system and wrote some of his first books to help fill a gap he had discovered years earlier.

“I remember being a child and not having many books about black people to read,” Haskins recalled in an autobiographical essay.

He made it his mission to reconstruct African American history book by book, covering subjects that ranged from slavery to the black power movement and beyond.

“Jim Haskins created a canon of literature, particularly for children, that is a resource for anyone studying black history,” said McClaurin, associate professor of anthropology at the University of Florida, where Haskins was on the faculty nearly 30 years. “He wanted to document the triumphs and tribulations of African Americans in books that are readable and accessible for the young, but not only for them.”

An amateur trumpeter, Haskins wrote a number of books about black music and musicians. His “Black Music in America” (1987) begins with slave songs and spirituals and moves through the years to blues and jazz. The subjects of his many biographies of popular singers and songwriters include Mabel Mercer, Stevie Wonder and Diana Ross. He also wrote a book on rap music and another on break dancing.

Haskins covered the events that led African Americans from slavery to desegregation by presenting each phase on its own. “Get on Board, The Story of the Underground Railroad” (1993) explains how slaves escaped from the Southern states to freedom in the North.

“The March on Washington” (1993) details the massive public demonstration 30 years earlier that enunciated the goals of the civil rights movement. The protest was famous in part for the “I Have a Dream” speech that the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. delivered on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial.

Haskins’ biographies fill out the social history.

He wrote “I Am Rosa Parks” with Parks, who had refused to give up her seat to a white passenger on a city bus in Montgomery, Ala., in 1955. Historians mark the incident as the start of the movement to integrate public services.

He also did biographies of Thurgood Marshall, the first black person appointed to the U.S. Supreme Court, in 1967, and political activist and former U.N. Ambassador Andrew Young, who was also mayor of Atlanta in the 1980s.

Haskins was as interested in the arts and entertainment as he was in political activism. His “The Cotton Club” (1977) was the basis for a 1984 movie directed by Francis Ford Coppola. In the book, Haskins re-creates the atmosphere of the 1920s Harlem nightclub where Lena Horne and Duke Ellington were among the leading acts. It was one of several dozen books he wrote for adult readers.

At first Haskins resisted biographies about black athletes, wanting to introduce young readers to other role models. But when Hank Aaron topped Babe Ruth’s record for career home runs, Haskins changed his mind. His “Babe Ruth and Hank Aaron, The Home Run Kings,” published in 1974, was the first of nearly a dozen sports biographies he wrote. Los Angeles Laker stars Kareem Abdul-Jabbar and Magic Johnson were among his other subjects.

The book that launched Haskins’ writing career was unlike any of the others. “Diary of a Harlem Schoolteacher” (1969) was based on a journal he had kept when he taught special education at Public School 92 in New York City during the mid-1960s. In it he described the outdated textbooks and other shortcomings at the school.

“By its truthfulness alone does it command our attention,” a New York Times reviewer wrote in 1969. “The book is like a weapon, cold, blunt, painful.”

Haskins was born in Demopolis, Ala., on Sept. 19, 1941, when African Americans were not allowed to use the public library. His mother gave him an encyclopedia, one volume at a time, sold at a local supermarket.

“Since my first major reading was the encyclopedia, this is probably ... why I prefer nonfiction,” he later said.

His parents separated when he was 12, and he moved with his mother to Boston, where he attended Boston Latin School, an academically rigorous public institution. After graduating, he entered Alabama State University.

When protests over segregation began in that state, Haskins joined a march in downtown Montgomery and was expelled from the university for it. He enrolled at Georgetown University in Washington, D.C., where he majored in psychology.

After graduating, he earned another bachelor’s degree, in history, at Alabama State. He went on to receive a master’s in social psychology at the University of New Mexico in 1963.

He had had a false career start as a stock trader in New York, but then realized he wanted to teach. After two years in the New York City public school system, Haskins became a lecturer at the New School, which was then called the New School for Social Research.

He joined the University of Florida as a professor of English in 1977. During the school year, he lived in Gainesville, where he was involved in the local black community, his friend McClaurin said.

Haskins is survived by his wife, two daughters and a son.