Negro America Transcribed is historically significant freedom music & spoken word on the integration period, more specifically dabbling in lesser known black American heritage and origins. In a country where history has been altered or modified in the past, analog recordings documenting history as it was are truly priceless.
These extremely brittle shellac records survived a brutal period in the states. In regions of the United States these would have been destroyed immediately for the ideals these recordings represent. It is beyond a honor and miracle to present and preserve these recordings. In a new finding June 2025, this article was updated to include newspapers from an archive, and to spotlight Curtis N. Hunt as the owner of Negro America Transcribed INC.
Roy Nichols was born in 1918 in the city of Hurlock, Maryland. The youngest of three, Roy sought foundation through the church as young as 8 years old by the influence of his grandfather’s preachings. This began an early start to a life of being called to the ministry for Roy. He would later on graduate Lincoln University at 23 years old. While at Lincoln he was President of the Student Council, Literary Editor (the University’s ‘The Lion’ book publishings), & President of Alpha Phi Alpha. He was also awarded “Most Likely To Succeed” & “Mr. Lincoln” while at Lincoln University & was announced class orator.
Roy Nichols was an essential key-figure in the Methodist church, being the first African American bishop elected. Nichols was a pioneer for racial equality, integration, and social justice countrywide. This article will entail a deep-dive of his life story while also serving as an avenue to bring his legacy and Negro America Transcribed to a new generation, giving the album a digital footprint while doing so.
In the Winter of 1950, the Lincoln University Bulletin had its quarterly publishing for friends & Lincoln alumni countrywide. In their Alumni News Notes (Year 1941) they mention Roy as so: REVEREND ROY NICHOLS, pastor of the Carl Downs Memorial Methodist Church, Oakland, California, has produced an album of four 12-inch plastic recordings with the title, ‘Negro America Transcribed’.
These recordings had been created in California, and the Pacific School of Religion is what brought Roy there. One can make a just assumption when exactly Reverend John Mickle & Roy Nichols became acquainted: they both were pastoring in Berkeley, California. By the year 1941 they had become extremely close collaborators.
Here is a video from 1995, 54 years after the release of Negro America Transcribed. At 49:00 you can hear Roy Nichols mention Downs Methodist Church (his beginnings). Roy Nichols went onto live a much-more detailed life than we are able to entail in this article, and has a more formal page for information available on the United Methodist Church’s website. He passed away at the age of 84 after suffering a stroke several years prior.
Reverend John Mickle was born 4 years earlier and has an equally impressive history of getting his feet on the ground to see changes through. Coming from Birmingham, he eventually would spend time in California, like Nichols, and also pastored in Cleveland, Ohio for a great deal. Mickle found cause for a change in Memphis and moved there 5 years after Negro America was made, in 1946.
From 1953-1969 John Mickle was the Director of Financial Aid & Campus Chaplin at LeMoyne College in Memphis. Mickle assisted in hosting bi-monthly meetings in Memphis to create strategies that would end the Jim Crow era in Memphis, Tennessee. He was a friend to Martin Luther King JR. and was at the forefront of change for the better nationwide.
These were donated to the Bessie Smith Cultural Center in Chattanooga, Tennessee. Discs 2 & 5 were not recovered with the rest of the album, realize two tracks are missing. This album may be listened to below or on YouTube.