Ralph Waldo Emerson McGill, journalist, editor, and publisher, was born 5 February 1898, in Igou's Ferry, Tennessee, and died 3 February 1969, in Atlanta, Georgia. McGill was a sports editor for the Nashville Banner (1923-1937); executive editor (1938-1941), editor-in-chief (1941-1960), and publisher (1960-1969) for the Atlanta Constitution. He also wrote for the New York Times Magazine, Atlantic Monthly, Reporter, Reader's Digest, and Saturday Evening Post.

Materials document McGill's personal life, his career as editor and publisher of the Atlanta Constitution, and his leadership role in the fight for civil rights in the South. Subjects include integration; local, state, and national politics; education; his travels; his book, The South and the Southerner (1963); and organizations in which he was interested, including: the Ku Klux Klan, the Southern Conference for Human Welfare, the Southern Regional Council, and the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People.