While in Washington, DC, for the Association for Psychological Science annual convention, I took an afternoon to visit the National Museum of African American History and Culture. I was especially interested in seeing the exhibit on Brown v. Board of Education which features the Mamie Phipps Clark doll study (Concourse C, Level 2: “Defending Freedom, Defining Freedom, 1876-1968”)–and it was her study. In a later interview, Kenneth Clark said, “the record should show [it] was Mamie’s primary project that I crashed. I sort of piggybacked on it” (Rothberg, 2022).
While what is here at the museum is largely—but not entirely—accurate, I’m sorry that they didn’t have the space to tell more of the story, because it is quite a story.
Biographical History of the Clarks
Kenneth and Mamie Clark both earned their bachelor’s degrees from Howard University. Kenneth’s was in political science; Mamie’s was in psychology. Both went on to earn their master’s in science degrees in psychology from Howard. And then both went on to Columbia University to earn their PhDs. That makes it sound easier than it was. Kenneth started the PhD program a few years earlier than Mamie. He was the only black person in the department and was the first black person to earn a PhD in psychology from Columbia. When Mamie joined the program, Kenneth had already graduated. Mamie, too, was the only black person in the department. When she graduated, she was the second black person—and the first black woman—to earn a PhD in psychology from Columbia (Kenneth B. Clark & Mamie Phipps Clark, 2004).
While in graduate school at Columbia, Phipps Clark chose to work with Henry Garrett, who would become department chair while she was there. Garrett was at the height of his career. Phipps Clark earned her PhD in 1943. Garrett was president of the Psychometric Society in 1943, president of the Eastern Psychological Association in 1944, and president of the American Psychological Association (APA) in 1946 (Winston, 1998).
Given Henry Garrett’s stature, it’s not a surprise that Phipps Clark would choose to study under him. However, Garrett was a racist and eugenicist, although it doesn’t sound like his public views shifted quite so far until the mid-1940s (Winston, 1998). In any case, surely Phipps Clark knew some of what he thought about race. Why, then, did Phipps Clark choose Garrett? One of Phipps Clark’s biographers said, “she wanted the challenge” (McNeill, 2017). I wonder if she thought she could influence his views on race. Or maybe she just saw him as the best researcher for her to learn from.
Incidentally, Garrett died in 1973. He lived to see Kenneth Clark become president of APA in 1971, 25 years after Garrett’s own presidency.
The Court Case
But now we’re ahead of the story. Let’s go back to the early 1950s. Should segregated public schools be permitted to remain segregated? The NAACP was shepherding five cases through the courts. In all cases, the NAACP attorneys argued that segregation of public schools violated the 14th amendment of the U.S. Constitution. Specifically, the focus of their argument was the clause that says that no state shall “deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.” Segregation, they argued, inherently does not provide equal protection. As each case wrapped up, appeals by losing counsel were filed. A date with the U.S. Supreme Court was inevitable.
In three of those cases, Kenneth Clark testified about the findings from the Phipps Clark doll study. Why was he testifying when it was really her study? Probably sexism. The attorneys likely thought that a man’s testimony would be more compelling to the all-male courts than a woman’s testimony. They were likely right. But there was one case where after Kenneth Clark testified, Phipps Clark testified. Why? Because the opposition brought Henry Garrett in as an expert witness.
If you were an NAACP attorney working on this case, this was just too good to pass up. You know that Garrett is going to share his racist views. How could you not ask for testimony from Mamie Phipps Clark—a black woman—who had earned her PhD with him? What she had to say was probably not as important as the fact of her existence. Garrett essentially testified that because of the maturity level of high school students, white students and Black students are not able to get along (transcript of Garrett’s testimony in Davis v. County School Board). Phipps Clark noted that there were already many elementary school children in mixed classrooms that were doing fine, and college students in mixed classrooms were also doing fine, so to argue that high school students would not do fine was absurd (transcript of Phipps Clark’s testimony in Davis v. County School Board). Neither Garrett nor Phipps Clark testified in any of the other four cases. Also interesting reading are the transcripts of Kenneth Clark’s testimony in his three cases: Davis v. County School Board (Virginia), Briggs v. Elliott (South Carolina), and Gebhart v. Belton (Delaware).
When the appeals reached the U.S. Supreme Court, the Court opted to hear them all as a group. Collectively, the case became known by the first case listed: Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka. We all know the outcome. Thurgood Marshall, lead counsel for the NAACP, made a well-argued presentation; 13 years later, Marshall would join the Court. The Court ruled unanimously in favor of desegregation. Unanimity on this decision was important for Chief Justice Earl Warren, and he worked hard to gain the support of the few Supreme Court justices who were leaning toward ruling the other way.
The segregation laws that kept white and Black children separate led Black children to have, Warren wrote, “a feeling of inferiority as to their status in the community that may affect their hearts and minds in a way unlikely to ever be undone.” This was a direct reference to the Phipps Clark doll study, making this the first time that psychological research was cited in a U.S. Supreme Court case.
The Dolls
Before wrapping up this post, I want to discuss the dolls used in this study. There were four dolls used, two black and two white. One source reports that “the Clarks had to paint a white baby doll brown for the tests, since African American dolls were not yet manufactured” (Blakemore, 2023). The National Park Service says that this was one of the dolls (U.S. National Park Service, 2021).
This doll looks very different from the two on display at the National Museum of African American History and Culture.
Because everything in the Smithsonian museums is catalogued, we can see the entries for these dolls. The entries for both the black doll (Smithsonian Institution, n.d.-a) and the white doll (Smithsonian Institution, n.d.-b) say that they were manufactured by the Effanbee Doll Company in 1968. That was 17 or 18 years after the doll study was conducted. Even though the museum placard says “…using these and other dolls,” we know that these dolls were not the dolls used. However, although I have been unable to find reports of the research, one source says that these dolls were used at Mamie Phipps Clark’s Northside Center for Child Development in later research (DeeBeeGee, 2020),
It is more likely that the doll in the National Park Service collection was one of the dolls used in the study.
Visit the Museum
To visit the National Museum of African American History and Culture, you will need a timed ticket. The tickets are free and if you know what day you will be visiting, reserve yours in advance. Otherwise, at 8am, they open up reservations for same-day tickets. I visited on a Saturday, and there were a few hundred same-day tickets available.
References
Blakemore, E. (2023, September 29). How dolls helped win Brown v. Board of Education. History. https://www.history.com/news/brown-v-board-of-education-doll-experiment
DeeBeeGee. (2020, September 6). Twinkie a.k.a last dolls test dolls. DeeBeeGee’s Virtual Black Doll MuseumTM. https://virtualblackdollmuseum.com/2020/09/06/twinkie-a-k-a-last-dolls-test-dolls/
Kenneth B. Clark & Mamie Phipps Clark. (2004). C250 Celebrates Columbians Ahead of Their Time. https://c250.columbia.edu/c250_celebrates/remarkable_columbians/kenneth_mamie_clark.html
McNeill, L. (2017, October 26). How a psychologist’s work on race identity helped overturn school segregation in 1950s America. Smithsonian Magazine. https://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/psychologist-work-racial-identity-helped-overturn-school-segregation-180966934/
Rothberg, E. (2022). Dr. Mamie Phipps Clark. National Women’s History Museum. https://www.womenshistory.org/education-resources/biographies/mamie-phipps-clark
Smithsonian Institution. (n.d.-a). Baby doll used by Northside Center for Child Development. Smithsonian Institution. Retrieved May 27, 2025, from https://www.si.edu/object/baby-doll-used-northside-center-child-development%3Anmaahc_2012.99.1
Smithsonian Institution. (n.d.-b). Baby doll used by Northside Center for Child Development. Smithsonian Institution. Retrieved May 27, 2025, from https://www.si.edu/object/baby-doll-used-northside-center-child-development%3Anmaahc_2012.99.2
U.S. National Park Service. (2021). Kenneth and Mamie Clark doll. https://www.nps.gov/brvb/learn/historyculture/clarkdoll.htm
Winston, A. S. (1998). Science in the service of the far right: Henry E. Garrett, the IAAEE, and the Liberty Lobby. Journal of Social Issues, 54(1), 179–210. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1540-4560.1998.tb01212.x
