PUBLIC OPINION

NOTE OF COMMENDATION

By the Rev. Dr. Earnest Lyon, D. D., L.L. D., Former Minister to

Liberia.

The author of this useful directory, Mr. Robert W. Coleman, de-
serves not only the confidence and sympathy of a generous public,
but the gratitude of his race. The fact that he is suffering from the
impairment of sight will help to further ingratiate him in public favor.
Many men, thus afflicted, would have been content to be a recipient
of charities; but this young man of genius and energy refused to beg
his way through life. He conceived the idea that a directory of the
professional, clerical, skilled and business people of the colored race
in the city of Baltimore was a necessity; and so it was, for up to this
time, there was no such institution for accurately locating the business
and professional men operating in the city. This idea readily com-
mended itself to a number of well disposed men and women, who
immediately saw an opportunity to aid an afflicted, but worthy, young
and struggling man to independence and usefulness. The first edition
attracted State-wide attention and commendation from prominent men
among both races, and now Coleman's Directory is a necessity, and
among the indispensibles of every public and business institution. I
therefore, take delight and pleasure in commending not only the book,
but the spirit of manhood and self-reliance, which prompted the author
in his effort to maintain himself against physical complications. Mr.
Coleman has been appointed a member of the Colored Division of the
Maryland Council of Defense.

War Department
Washington

February I5th, 1918
Mr. Robert W. Coleman,
1830 Lorman Street,

Baltimore, Maryland.

Dear Mr. Coleman:

I write to say that the National Business League is always pleased
to make note of such enterprises as you are fostering. I hope that
your Business Directory of Baltimore may receive the cordial sup-
port of the business and professional classes of Baltimore. The cir-
culation of your booklet should prove incalculably helpful in fostering
race pride, and at the same time bring about that encouragement of
negro business so devoutly to be welcomed.

Yours very sincerely,

EMMETT J. SCOTT,
Secretary National Negro Business League, Tuskegee, Ala.

Department of Commerce

Bureau of the Census

Washington

Mr. Robt. W. Coleman,
Baltimore, Md.

My Dear Sir:

I take pleasure on behalf of the Library of Congress to acknowl-
edge the receipt of your directory of the Colored Professional, Cler-
ical, Skilled and "Business Directory of Baltimore City, and further
to say it will be bound and placed in the collection of books by col-
ored authors and compilers.

In the first publication of its kind ever recorded by a student of
a blind institution.

Thanking you most heartily for the same, I beg to remain,
Very sincerely yours,

DANIEL MURRAY,