Walter F. White (1893–1955) was the author of the books Fire in the Flint (Knopf, 1924) and Flight (Knopf, 1926) among others. He was a civil rights activist and journalist headed The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People from 1929 to his death in 1955. White gleaned insider information from doing undercover work in white supremacist spaces, including having connections with and nearly joining the Klu Klux Klan. Only months after his article "Election Day in Florida" was published in The Crisis, White was unintentionally deputized during the Tulsa race massacre while pretending to be a news reporter.