Horace R. Cayton Jr. was born April 12, 1903, in Seattle, Washington, to newspaper publisher Horace R. Cayton, Sr. and Susie Revels. His mother was the daughter of Hiram Rhodes Revels, the first black American elected to the United States Senate. The Caytons maintained an upper-middle-class standard of living, including a home in a wealthy, predominantly white neighborhood and employing a full-time Japanese servant.[1] His father was active in Republican politics and had acquaintances throughout the black American intelligentsia, with Booker T. Washington as one memorable house guest.[1]
In 1934, Cayton went to work as a researcher for the United States Department of the Interior, co-authoring Report on the Negro's Share in Industrial Rehabilitation with George Sinclair Mitchell in 1935.[3]
Following his stint with the Interior Department, Cayton moved to Nashville, Tennessee, where he taught economics at Fisk University for a time.[3] Cayton subsequently returned to government employment heading a Chicago-based research project for the Works Progress Administration (WPA) for three years,[3] ultimately producing a book from research in this period, Black Workers and the New Unions (1939).
In 1940, Cayton became the director of the Parkway Community House in Chicago.[3] He would remain working in that capacity until 1949.[4]
While living in New York during the 1950s, Cayton had an affair with Lore Segal, an author and Holocaust survivor. Segal wrote about their relationship in her novel, My First American.[7]
Report on the Negro's Share in Industrial Rehabilitation: Sections on the Birmingham District, Car and Railroad Repair Shops, Conclusions and Recommendations by George Sinclair Mitchell, with Whom was Associated Horace Cayton; Submitted to Clark Foreman, Counsel on the Economic Status of Negroes, Office of the Secretary of the Interior, May, 1935. With George Sinclair Mitchell. n.c.: n.p, [1935].
Black Workers and the New Unions. With George Sinclair Mitchell. Chapel Hill, NC: University of North Carolina Press, 1939.
Negro Housing in Chicago. New York: Council for Social Action of the Congregational and Christian Churches, 1940.
The Psychological Approach to Race Relations. Portland, OR: Reed College, 1946.
"Bronzeville," with St. Clair Drake, Holiday, May 1947. —Reprinted as a pamphlet.
The Chinese in the United States and the Chinese Christian Churches: A Statement Condensed for the National Conference on the Chinese Christian Churches from a Study by Horace R. Cayton and Anne O. Lively Incorporating Field Work and Consultation by Peter Y.F. Shih. With Anne O. Lively and Marjorie M. Carter. New York: Bureau of Research and Survey, National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America, 1955.
Long Old Road: An Autobiography. New York: Trident Press, 1965.
Personal Experiences in Race Relations. n.c.: Horace R. Cayton, 1967.
Horace Roscoe Cayton: Selected Writings. In two volumes. Ed Diaz, ed. Seattle, WA: Bridgewater-Collins, 2002.
^ abRobert Washington, "Horace Cayton: Reflections on an Unfulfilled Sociological Career", The American Sociologist, vol. 28, no. 1 (Spring 1997), p. 57.
^Bullard, Robert D. (2007). The Black Metropolis in the Twenty-First Century: Race, Power, and Politics of Place. Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, Inc.
Stanley D. Stevens (ed.), Carry On!: The Carli & Stanley Stevens' Collection of Correspondence and Memorabilia from and about Horace Roscoe Cayton Jr. Santa Cruz, CA: S.D. Stevens, 2003.
Robert Washington, "Horace Cayton: Reflections on an Unfulfilled Sociological Career", The American Sociologist, vol. 28, no. 1 (Spring 1997), pp. 55–74. In JSTOR
