Laine, Henry Allen

Henry A. Laine was born near College Hill in Madison County, KY. He was a poet and wrote many poems using Negro dialect. Laine was one of three poets invited to appear before the 1923 Kentucky Negro Educational Association (KNEA) body where he read Fine Greetings to Colored Educators. [The other two invited poets were Joseph C. Cotter, Sr. and Joseph C. Cotter, Jr.] Henry A. Laine is the author of Foot Prints (1914), a book of poems. He was also an educator and taught school for 21 years, first in Clark County for a brief period, and then the remainder of his teaching years were in Madison County. He founded the Madison Colored Teachers Institute and was over the organization for 20 years. Henry A. Laine was Madison County’s first African American agricultural extension agent in 1915. He was the County Demonstrator for the Colored People and helped establish homemaker and farmer clubs. Henry A. Laine helped to organize the Madison County Colored Chautauqua. He was inducted into the Kentucky Civil Rights Hall of Fame in 2003. He was the father of Beatrice "Tommie" Holland. For more see Black American Writers Past and Present. A biographical and bibliographical dictionary, by T. G. Rush, et al. The Henry Allen Laine Papers, 1874-1988, are at Eastern Kentucky University, Special Collections and Archives. The Henry Allen Laine Collection is at Berea College Special Collections and Archives.