As Director of Publicity and Research for the NAACP, Du Bois was founder and editor of The Crisis magazine for twenty-four years. Under Du Bois' editorship, The Crisis became the most influential voice of black protest in the first half of the twentieth century. In addition to Du Bois' editorials, The Crisis featured accounts of lynchings and brutalities committed against blacks that were often ignored by the white press. But Du Bois also encouraged black writers and artists to submit their work for publication. His effort to identify and stimulate the development of a distinct Afro-American culture was one of the factors that led to the flowering of the Harlem Renaissance.