The talented Black scholars whom no white university would hire

22nd August 2011   ·   0 Comments

(Special to the NNPA from thedefendersonline.com) — Few people give much thought to how racism does serious economic or professional damage to the very person who practices racial exclusion or discrimination.

In a sports example, the Boston Red Sox had the chance to sign Jackie Robinson in 1945, two years before Robinson broke baseball’s color barrier with the Brooklyn Dodgers. Because of deep-seated racism within the Boston organization, the Red Sox failed to hire Robinson. For years Mike “Pinky” Higgins boasted “there would never be any niggers playing baseball for the Red Sox,” while he was manager of the club.

Only after Higgins was fired in 1959 and 12 years after Jackie Robinson signed for the Dodgers did the Red Sox field their first Black players. The Boston team was the last major league franchise to do so. The culture of racism prevailed in the Red Sox clubhouse for years to come. As late as 1991 there was only one African American on the Red Sox major league roster. This climate of racism in Boston may have produced some long-lasting and self-inflicted wounds. From 1945, when the Red Sox blew their opportunity to sign Jackie Robin­son, to the end of the century, the team never won a World Series.

In making their faculty selections, the most liberal and prestigious universities faithfully observed the custom of racial exclusion well into the 20th century.

Among the customs and taboos that governed centuries of race relations in the United States was the universally observed convention that race or skin color was a rigid qualification for a faculty post at any major college or university or indeed for membership in the intellectual community. Driven by the prevailing racial belief in the biological and cultural inferiority of the Negro, white institutions of higher education long assumed that no Negro need be considered for any academic position. As Dr. W.E.B. DuBois discovered on many occasions, it was thought most impertinent to even raise the question.

In making their faculty selections, the most liberal and prestigious universities, such as Harvard, Yale, Princeton, Stan­ford, Duke, and the University of Chicago, faithfully observed the custom of racial exclusion well into the 20th century.

State and federal governments also followed the same racial custom, and as a result there was no legislative or judicial body that was prepared to break the grip of skin color as a controlling factor in faculty selections. To be sure, at most respected institutions of learning there was no Orval Faubus or George Wallace blocking the schoolhouse door, but the exclusionary effect was precisely the same.

Virtually the only exceptions to the rule of exclusion were the private Black colleges and the racially segregated state-operated Black colleges in the southern states. These institutions, now know as HBCUs, were funded – often generously – by whites and philanthropic institutions that whites had founded. But under prevailing racial stereotypes, whites admired Blacks for their brawn rather than their brains. In most cases, higher education for Negroes was restricted to the crafts and trades normally taught at so-called industrial schools. And in the main, Black faculty were trained to teach the limited courses offered at these institutions.

As a result, for most of the history of the U.S., a fundamental bigotry undermined the potential contributions of some extraordinary intellects. Bigotry also rob­bed America’s great universities of the talents of major Jewish scholars. In a classic example, Harvard University in the 1940s failed to hire economist Paul Samuelson because he was Jewish. MIT had no such compunction. Samuelson went on to publish the leading college textbook in economics and to win the Nobel Prize. To this day, Harvard has never admitted its mistake.

Allison Davis: The First Breakthrough in the Academic Color Barrier

By and large, the failure of the country’s predominantly white universities to hire even nationally noted Black intellectuals continued until the civil rights movement of the 1960s. But in the generation before that, W. Allison Davis was the trailblazer. In 1942 he was the first Black scholar hired by a top-ranked university, and in 1948 he was the first awarded tenure.

Dr. W.E.B. DuBois discovered on many occasions that it was thought most impertinent for a Black academic to even consider applying for an academic post.

W. Allison Davis was born in 1902 in Washington, D.C. He came from a relatively prosperous family that read Shakespeare and Dickens. Davis went to Williams College in Massachusetts, a highly regarded school where he was not permitted to live on the rigidly segregated campus. He was obliged to take a room at a Black-owned boarding house down the street from the college. Yet he graduated as valedictorian of the Class of 1924.

Dr. Davis went on to earn two master’s degrees from Harvard University. But at a time when it was common for white scholars with similar credentials to gain positions at major research institutions, Davis was unable to find such employment. Instead he conducted independent research on the relationship between race and class in a small southern community and then took a teaching post at Dillard University, the historically Black college in New Orleans.

Only after earning his Ph.D. in 1942 was he finally hired by a prestigious white school, the University of Chicago. And Chicago hired him only after the liberal Julius Rosenwald Fund offered to pay his salary. Once hired, Davis was unable to buy a house in the neighborhood of the university.

Nonetheless, six years later, at the age of 46, Allison Davis was awarded tenure, the first Black professor ever to win tenure at a major northern university.

Before the Davis appointment and also for many years after, scores of highly qualified Black scholars were ignored by faculty search committees at the nation’s predominantly white universities. Many of these prestigious universities did not hire their first Black faculty member until the civil rights era.

Here are a few examples, listed in alphabetical order, of those Black scholars who were never offered a teaching post at a leading university or were offered a position late in their careers after the civil rights movement opened up employment opportunities for African Americans.

• Edward A. Bouchet graduated from Yale College in 1874. Two years later he was awarded a Ph.D. in physics with a dissertation entitled “Measuring Refrac­tive Indices.” In fact, Bouchet was the first African American to earn a doctorate in any field. He was also only the sixth person in the Western Hemisphere to earn a Ph.D. in physics. Yet, despite the shortage of qualified professors of physics, Bouchet was unable to find work at any institution of higher learning. Instead he labored for 26 years at the School for Colored Youth in Philadelphia, which had no library or laboratory facilities.

• Sterling A. Brown was a graduate of Washington, D.C.’s prestigious Dunbar High School. In 1922 he graduated Phi Beta Kappa from Williams College and in 1923 he earned a master’s degree from Harvard University. Unable to obtain a teaching post at any white college or university, Brown taught English at Howard University for more than 40 years. In the 1970s he did finally teach at a number of white colleges and universities.

In 1889 Alfred O. Coffin earned a Ph.D. in zoology from Illinois Wesleyan University, the first African American to earn a doctorate in the field. No predominantly white university would even consider Coffin for an appointment to its faculty. After brief teaching stints at Wiley College in Texas and Alcorn State University in Mississippi, both historically Black institutions, he spent 10 years as a high school principal in San Antonio and Kansas City. He then became the booking agent for a Black pianist.

• W.E.B. DuBois was the most influential Black intellectual of the 20th century. He held a bachelor’s degree and a Ph.D. from Harvard.

Yet, despite his remarkable talent and credentials, he was unable to find a job teaching at any major university. Instead he taught at Atlanta University and Wilber­force University. In 1899 the University of Pennsylvania persuaded DuBois to leave his post at Wilberforce to undertake the famous sociological study which was later published as The Philadelphia Negro. However, Penn was not willing to give a place on its faculty to DuBois. Instead he attained the non-faculty post of “assistant in sociology” at the University of Pennsylvania.

• Jessie Redmon Fau­set was a celebrated educator, novelist, poet and critic, best known as the literary editor of W.E.B. DuBois’ magazine Crisis. She studied at Cornell, where she was prohibited from living in the college dormitories. But carrying a course load that included four years of Latin, fours years of English, four years of German, two years of French, and two years of Greek, she earned her bachelor’s degree in 1905 and became the first Black woman elected to membership in Phi Beta Kappa. Before signing on at Crisis, Fauset was not only unable to find a teaching post at a white college or university, she was also denied a teaching position in the Philadelphia public school system because of her race. Fauset was able to secure employment in the Washington, D.C. and New York City public schools.

• Sociologist E. Franklin Fra­­zier was among the great American intellectuals of the first half of the 20th century. Over a long and distinguished career, Frazier authored eight books including the controversial and highly influential Black Bour­geoisie. From the first grade until his graduation from Howard University in 1916, Frazier never went to school with a white person. After graduating with honors from Howard, Frazier enrolled in a master’s degree program at Clark University in Worcester, Massachusetts. After Frazier earn­ed his master’s degree, no major research university was willing to hire him. Accordingly, he headed to the South where he taught at a number of historically Black colleges and universities. Frazier earned a doctorate at the Univer­sity of Chicago in 1931. Yet, be­cause of his skin color, he was still unemployable at any major white university. In 1934 Frazier took a position as head of the department of sociology at Howard Univer­sity where he remained on the Howard faculty until his retirement in 1959.

• If American society in the early 20th century had permitted any Black person to claim the title of “Renaissance Man,” James Weldon Johnson would have headed the list. An educator, lawyer, novelist, poet, songwriter, diplomat, journalist, musician, civil rights leader and politician, Johnson was a giant intellectual figure of the 20th century. He was a graduate of Atlanta University and was trained in the law. Johnson composed more than 200 songs and wrote several books. But when he looked for employment in the academic world, segregation ruled. He took a position at the historically Black Fisk University.

• Percy L. Julian was born to a grandson of a slave on Jefferson Davis Avenue in Mont­gomery, Alabama. At age 16, he was accepted as a “sub freshman” at DePauw University in Green­castle, Indiana. Prohibited from living in a college dormitory, he found space in the attic of a fraternity where he worked as a waiter. Despite this huge workload, Julian was elected to Phi Beta Kappa and was named class valedictorian in 1920. After graduation, Julian received a fellowship at Harvard, where he studied for his master’s degree. He later went to Vienna, Austria, to conduct research for his Ph.D. In Austria, Julian developed a research interest in the chemist of the soybean. After earning his doctorate in 1931, Julian returned to the United States to head the chemistry department at Howard University. However, frustrated by his inability to win major research funding or a teaching position at a major research university, he left the academic world in 1935 to become chief chemist for the Glidden Company. He later developed synthetic male and female hormones from soybeans, which were used to fight cancer and prevent miscarriages. Perhaps his greatest discovery was synthetic cortisone.

• When Ernest Everett Just completed his bachelor’s de­gree at Dartmouth College in 1907, one of the great scientific minds of the early 20th century had but two choices – to teach or preach, and then only among Blacks. Young Just took a position as an instructor in English at Howard University at an annual salary of $400. Soon after, Just was appointed to a post in Howard’s department in zoology. He also taught physiology at the university’s medical school. He remained on the faculty at Howard Univ­ersity for more than 30 years. But an extremely heavy teaching load and a lack of adequate laboratory facilities prevented him from conducting any major research there, and skin color prevented this distinguished scientist from conducting research at any better equipped university. Just did his most significant research during summers at the Woods Hole Marine Biological Laboratory on Cape Cod. Ironically, Professor Just was frequently consulted about the qualifications of potential in­ductees to the prestigious Na­tional Academy of Sciences, an association that would not admit him as a member because of his race.

• Alain Leroy Locke was born in Phila­delphia, the only child of a well-to-do African-American pedigree. His mother, a teacher, instilled in the young Locke a passion for literature, education, and erudition. In three years’ time, he graduated Phi Beta Kappa and magna cum laude from Harvard College. In 1907 Locke became the first African-American Rhodes Scholar. Because no white university would hire him, Locke remained on the faculty of Howard University for 41 years.

• Rayford W. Logan ex­cel­led as a student first at Washington, D.C.’s elite M Street High School, then at Williams College and Harvard University. After completing his doctorate at Harvard, the racial rules of academic selection frustrated his dream of securing a teaching position in the history department of a major university. Instead he worked with Carter G. Woodson at the Association for the Study of Negro Life and History in Washington. He later taught at Virginia Union University, Atlanta University, and Howard University, all historically Black institutions.

• In the early decades of the 20th century no Black man in America, with the exception of W.E.B. Du Bois, was held in higher esteem in the intellectual community than Kelly Miller. Miller was born in South Carolina in 1863, the sixth of 10 children of a free Black tenant farmer and a Black slave woman. Miller’s father served in the Confederate Army. Miller won a scholarship to Hoard University and earned a bachelor’s degree in 1886. He was then admitted to Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore where he studied mathematics, physics, and astronomy under Simon Newcomb, head of the U.S. Naval Observatory. But a year later he was forced to leave the university when the trustees raised tuition to a level he could no longer afford. He completed his graduate work at Howard, eventually earning a master’s degree as well as a law degree. With employment opportunities closed to him at the nation’s predominantly white institutions, Miller joined the Howard University faculty in 1890 and served as professor of mathematics and sociology for nearly half a century.

• Roscoe Lewis McKin­ney was the first African Ameri­can to earn a Ph.D. in anatomy. He achieved this milestone at the University of Chicago in 1930. McKinney could not find a teaching post at any white university or medical school. Instead he established the department of anatomy at the College of Medicine at Howard University. He remained on the Howard faculty for more than 40 years.

• Inman E. Page was valedictorian of the Class of 1887 at Brown University. Page taught for one year at a Black seminary in Mississippi and then took an administrative post at Lincoln University in Missouri. He later served as president of Lincoln and also Langston University, a historically Black institution in Oklahoma. At the end of his career this gifted African-American educator was relegated to managing the Black division of the segregated public school system in Oklahoma City.

• Charles Henry Tur­ner was awarded a Ph.D. in entomology at the University of Chicago in 1907. Turner published 49 scientific papers and was considered the nation’s foremost authority on insect behavior. Yet, after earning his doctoral degree, the only teaching positions he was offered was at racially segregated Sumner High School in St. Louis, where he spent the remainder of his academic career.

• Grant Delbert Vena­ble was the first graduate of African ancestry from the Calif­ornia Institute of Techno­logy. He earned a bachelor’s de­gree in civil engineering from Cal­Tech in 1932. Unable to obtain employment in the academic world or in engineering, Venable took a job as an insurance agent with the Golden State Mutual Life Insurance Co. In 1945 he and his brother-in-law William Tatum en­tered the hotel business. They later bought the George R. Healey Manufacturing Co., which produced and distributed erasers to major school districts across the country.

• Carter G. Woodson was born in 1875 into a Virginia farming family of former slaves. Having to work the fields, he was not able to enter high school until he was 20 years old. A graduate of the racially integrated Berea College in 1903, Woodson went on to graduate studies at Har­vard Univer­sity. Though widely ack­now­ledged to be the father of Black history, Woodson never re­ceived an of­fer to reach at a major white university.

The Other Side of the Color Line

For generations, segregation in the academic world at large was a tremendous bonus for Black col­leg­es and uni­versities in one res­pect. It insulated them from competition from the better endowed Ivy League universities for the nation’s top Black scholars. During the 1930s Howard Univer­sity in Washington, D.C., for example, was able to assemble on its faculty perhaps the greatest collection of Black intellectuals the nation had ever seen and will see.

Once the nation’s premier research universities began to actively recruit Black scholars to their facilities, the historically Black institutions were put at a great disadvantage from which, many suggest, they have never recovered. The Black schools not only could not pay the same high salaries as the predominantly white universities, but perhaps more importantly the Black universities did not have the research funds, facilities, laboratories, equipment, libraries, and other resources that scholars require to conduct their research.

In this respect, racial integration served to weaken the nation’s historically Black colleges and universities.

This article was originally published in the August 22, 2011 print edition of The Louisiana Weekly newspaper