Belle da Costa Greene, original name in full Belle Marion Greener, (born December 13, 1883, Washington, D.C., U.S. died May 10, 1950, New York, New York), American librarian and bibliographer, the moving force in organizing and expanding the collection of J.P. Morgan as the Morgan Library. Greene was the daughter of lawyer Richard T. Greener, the first African American to graduate from Harvard and the first librarian of colour at the University of South Carolina, and Genevieve Fleet, both of whom were of mixed-race families. Although Belle had been listed as “Colored” on her birth certificate, she was light-skinned, as were