George McLeod (Mac) Bryan was a Wake Forest alumnus, earning both his BA (1941) and MA (1944) from Wake Forest College. He continued his education at Yale Divinity School and earned his B.D. (1947) and Ph.D. (1951). Bryan was a faculty member of the Wake Forest Religion Department from 1956 until he retired in 1987 as professor emeritus.

Bryan was a prolific writer. He is best known for his work on and relationships with Clarence Jordan, founder of the Koinonia farm community in Georgia, and Beyers Naudé, a South African minister and leading anti-apartheid activist. Bryan was also active in a number of religious and civil rights organizations and causes. He served on or led the N.C. Human Relations Commission, the N.C. Committee on Civil Rights, the Fellowship of Southern Churchmen, the N.C. Conference of Christian and Jews, Operation Crossroads Africa, and was chairman of the American Friends Service Committee on Integration. During the Cold War, he led a peace mission to Russian and helped organize a Winston-Salem branch of the N.C. Committee to End the [Vietnam] War.

Bryan passed away September 29, 2010, and is buried in his native Garner, NC.

Materials in this collection include Freedom of Information Act materials dating from 1947 to 1996.