When
Chicago Defender founder Robert
S. Abbott died in 1940, his nephew John H. Sengstacke took
over the company as president, moving up from vice president
and general manager.
One of Sengstacke's first actions was to call a meeting of the
nation's largest black newspapers with the idea of forming a
national trade organization.
From Feb. 29 to March 2, 1940, representatives of 20 black papers
met in Chicago and formed the National Negro Publishers Association.
Sengstacke was named president and kept that position for seven
terms.
Today the organization is named the National
Newspapers Publishers Association and claims 210 members
with weekly circulation of 15 million people, reaching more
than a third of the country's black households.
