After graduating, Wright helped Pitts find a job coaching and teaching at Immaculata High School in Birmingham, Alabama, where he brought both track and basketball teams to regional medals and best records in a single year.

[2] Later, Wright paved the way for Pitts to serve as principal and primary instructor of the Cardinal Gibbons Institute[5] in St. Mary's County, Maryland, from 1938 to 1944.

This gave Pitts the subject for his master's and PhD degrees from Catholic University in Washington, D.C.: the cooperative movement in rural black communities.

[6] The Harry Sylvester novel Dearly Beloved is loosely based on the activities of Father McKenna and Dr. Pitts in St. Mary's County during this period.

[7] Before joining the federal government's Office of Education in 1961, Pitts was head of the social science department of Coppin State Teachers College in Baltimore, Maryland.

[8] While Nathan was at Shaw, one of his students was Angie Brooks, who later became a Liberian diplomat and was the first (and, to date, only) African female elected president of the United Nations General Assembly.