Harvard University

University Hall, Harvard Yard by John Harvard statue

University Hall is the site of the founding of the American Folklore Society in 1888. Members of the Society included Mark Twain, Franz Boas (the so-called “Father of American Anthropology”), Zora Neale Hurston (an author who wrote during the Harlem Renaissance and is perhaps best known for her 1937 novel Their Eyes Were Watching God), and President Rutherford B. Hayes. Comprised of almost 2,200 scholars, anthropologists, museum curators, professional folklorists and librarians, among others, the Society is now based at Ohio State University and produces a quarterly publication, the Journal of American Folklore.