Stella Brewer Brookes

Stella Brewer Brookes (January 22, 1903 – November 1993) was a professor of English at Clark College (later Clark Atlanta University) from 1924 to 1969. She was a folklorist and a writer.

Early life and education Brewer was born in Fannin, Texas, one of the six children of J.H. Brewer and Minnie Brewer. Her father was a grocer and her mother was a schoolteacher. Her brother J. Mason Brewer was also a folklorist. In 1923 she graduated valedictorian and magna cum laude from Wiley College in Marshall, Texas. She earned a Master of Arts in English Literature in 1930 from the University of Michigan, and completed doctoral studies at Cornell University in 1946, after her husband died. Her dissertation was titled "Folklore in the Writings of Joel Chandler Harris".

Career In 1924 Brewer became a professor at Clark College in Atlanta; there, she chaired the English department, advised student publication, The Mentor, and founded the Atlanta University Center's Literary Symposium. She also taught summer programs at the Alabama State Teachers College. She was the author of Joel Chandler Harris, Folklorist. (1950), and other works on Harris. Stella Brewer Brookes retired from Clark College in 1969, after 45 years, and received an Honorary Doctor of Letters degree from the college. she delivered the chapter's Emancipation Day address in 1939. She was also active in the Georgia Federation of Colored Women's Clubs. Her husband died in 1944. Stella Brewer Brookes died in November 1993, aged 90 years, in Austin, Texas. Her papers are in the Robert W. Woodruff Library of the Atlanta University Center.

Publications

Brookes, Stella Brewer, Introduction, in: Harris, Joel Chandler, Uncle Remus, Schocken Books, New York 1965, pp. vii–xx.