Dr. Hancock, who also was a professor at Virginia Union University, was a leading spokesman for African-American equality in the generation before the Civil Rights Movement. In columns that he wrote for the Associated Negro Press, he advised his readers how to get by in tough times while still taking principled stands against segregation, according to Encyclopedia Virginia. His work with the Virginia Interracial Commission and the Southern Regional Council also suggested his willingness to be both outspoken and pragmatic in the midst of the fight against segregation — a fight, he wrote, that must be won “if the Negro is to survive.” Born in 1884, Dr. Hancock died in 1970.
