Jeff Bezos has asked the D.C. Public Library Foundation to consider naming the Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial Library’s auditorium after the late Toni Morrison — the first Black woman to receive the Nobel Prize in literature — rather than himself, after thousands sent letters demanding the library system’s board of trustees reverse its original decision.
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The library’s executive director, Richard Reyes-Gavilan, had initially recommended naming the auditorium “The Bezos Auditorium,” in recognition of the billionaire Amazon founder’s $2.7 million donation last year, the largest the foundation has received, to support a literacy program for children. (Bezos owns The Washington Post.)
But local activists and residents were outraged last week after DCist/WAMU reported that the board of trustees had voted to go through with that name change. A group launched a letter-writing campaign opposing the decision that, as of Friday morning, led to more than 17,000 sent.
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The library pivoted after receiving Bezos’s email Thursday night and will be reaching out to the Morrison family, Reyes-Gavilan said in a statement to The Post.
“We are thrilled that Jeff Bezos has recommended that the MLK auditorium be named for Nobel Prize-winning author Toni Morrison,” he said. “We could not think of a better individual to be honored in our beautiful new building. We look forward to reaching out to the Morrison family for their support.”
Morrison’s son, Harold Ford Morrison, was happy to hear about the recommendation but did not have an official comment at this time, said Nicholas Latimer, a spokesman for the Alfred A. Knopf publishing company. The King family could not be reached for comment.
Organizers of the letter-writing campaign on Friday called it “wonderful” that Morrison’s name was being considered for the auditorium space, located inside the newly renovated library at 9th and G streets NW. But they said such a recommendation should come from the community — not from Bezos.
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“I would never fight against Toni Morrison’s name being on that library, because that’s a name that truly honors the legacy of Dr. King,” said Nee Nee Taylor, one of the core organizers and a District native. “Yet the process of how that was developed is still hurtful and harmful to the community of D.C.”
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The library system’s policy for naming spaces at neighborhood libraries and the Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial Library notes that a donor may be recognized with named places such as study rooms, auditoriums and gardens.
In an email sent Thursday night to the D.C. Public Library Foundation and provided to The Post, Bezos wrote that he was first “honored and grateful” when the foundation offered to name the auditorium after him — a recognition he said he did not seek out when making his donation.
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“Since then,” he wrote, “some in the community have suggested a person of color would be more appropriate as a name for the auditorium, especially as it sits inside the Martin Luther King Jr. library. That makes considerable sense to me.”
Those behind the letter-writing campaign said they did not oppose the library’s acceptance of Bezos’s gift, and the campaign’s templated letter does not mention his race. Rather, organizers said they opposed the board’s decision to subsequently honor one of the richest men in the world in a library dedicated to a civil rights icon who criticized capitalism and called for a more equitable society in which wealth is not held by just a few.
“Jeff Bezos does not reflect my values, nor the values Dr. King fought to uphold,” the letter that people were encouraged to sign and send to the library reads. “On behalf of Black Washingtonians, working class people around the globe, and everyone who uses the DC Public Library system, I ask that you reopen this decision and not give a place of honor at DC’s flagship library to someone who represents the worst of our economic system.”
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MLK Library Friends, a nonprofit organization that supports the library, also expressed its objection to naming the auditorium after Bezos.
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“Bezos’ operating principles to date have often been at odds with the values for which Dr. King gave his life,” the group wrote in an open letter Thursday.
Taylor, along with three other activists among the group behind the letter-writing campaign, stepped off the elevator onto the library’s fourth floor Thursday afternoon and saw the words “D.C. CHANGEMAKERS.” The exhibits outside the doors of the auditorium, they saw, honored civil rights leaders like King and celebrated D.C.’s unique history, highlighting go-go music and former D.C. mayor Marion Barry.
“Can you imagine having a go-go event and saying it is going to be at the Jeff Bezos Auditorium? It doesn’t even add up,” said Taylor, who is also a co-conductor for Harriet’s Wildest Dreams, a Black-led mutual aid and community defense organization
She swiveled her head around to survey the exhibits.
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“This is all poor stories, to be honest with you,” Taylor said. “All these stories is about marginalized communities and marginalized people, so why would you put Jeff Bezos’s name around this? It’s hurtful. It breaks my heart.”
The board had voted during its Jan. 26 meeting to rename the auditorium for Bezos, with four votes in favor and one abstention, according to a recording of the meeting the library provided to The Post.
Bezos did not acknowledge the criticism of his wealth or business practices in the Thursday email to the foundation. A representative did not respond to a request to comment on the pushback to the auditorium naming.
Morrison’s works — among them, “Beloved,” “The Bluest Eye,” “Song of Solomon” and “Sula” — have inspired readers with lyrical writings that portray the realities of Black life in America. They have also been the target of right-wing campaigns to remove them from school libraries and classrooms.
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In the email, Bezos called Morrison “a dear friend.” Bezos’s ex-wife, MacKenzie Scott, was one of Morrison’s students at Princeton and considered her a mentor.
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“One of my fondest memories is sitting on [Morrison’s] porch for hours on a lazy, warm afternoon, eating lunch, sipping vodka, and exchanging stories,” Bezos wrote. “At that time, her health was already declining but her mind was as agile as ever, as was her sense of humor.”
Bezos’s donation to the library foundation is supporting “Beyond the Book,” a childhood literacy program aimed to serve an estimated 42,000 D.C. children in kindergarten through third grade over the next few years with free books, resources and programming.