A00043 - The Dunbar- Amherst Connection: 1892-1961

The Dunbar-Amherst Connection: 1892-1961 by Matthew Randolph on Prezi

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 Phone Interview with Raymond Hayes '59

• "Larry, Bob, and I were very close friends. We grew up in the same neighborhood in Washington, D.C., were all interested in science and medicine and were encouraged by the opportunity to attend Amherst together."
• "I was recruited and positively influenced by Chauncey Larry, Percy Barnes and Montague Cobb, all black alumni from Amherst and friends of my family."

Homegoing Service for Larry '27 (1905-1995)

cycle of encouragement

1923 photo from the Amherst College Archives

Chauncey Larry '27

Amherst College Olio, 1925

Amherst College Olio, 1926

(Left to Right)

Lewis '23, Cobb '25, Hastie '25, Thompson '27, Bolin '25, Cook '25

Classes of 1920-1929

C. H. Houston '15

Classes of 1930-1949

Classes of 1906-1918

The Dunbar-Amherst Connection: 1892-1961

Presentation by Matt Randolph

1920 - Frederick Allen Parker

1921 - Robert Percy Barnes

1923 - Charles William Lewis

1925 - William Montague Cobb

William Henry Hastie

Mercer Cook Jr.

1926 - Charles Drew

Thurman Luce Dodson

1927 - Chauncey Larry

1928 - Clarence White

1929 - Harold Over Lewis

David Utz

George Williams

1934- Harry Greene Risher

1940- Highwarden Just

1943- John Hurst

1906- Robert Nicholas Mattingly

1907- James LeCount Chestnut

1909- James Blaine Hunter

1911- John Pinkett

1912- Edward Gray

1915- Charles Hamilton Houston

1916- Francis Dent

Conclusions

My Story

What allowed for these Dunbar men to thrive at Amherst?

-Dunbar education

-support system of fellow Dunbar men

Why did they choose Amherst?

-A long-lived network of Dunbar-Amherst alumni who sustained an "inter-generational cycle of motivation and matriculation"

Classes of 1951-1961

Three Generations of Randolph Men

Why does the glory of Dunbar fade?

My grandfather, Nathaniel Randolph, was a member of the Dunbar Class of 1943.

The Story Begins:

William Tecumseh Sherman Jackson, Amherst Class of'1892

"We believe that in a democracy free secondary education should be provided for all, regardless of race, except those whose physical or mental abnormalities make such training impossible. The pupils should be prepared to meet effectively the changing situations in their present and future lives."

-"The Philosophy of Dunbar High School"

(November 1944)

The Future of the Dunbar-Amherst Connection

What is Dunbar's connection to Amherst?

1951- Mercer Cook Jr. (*legacy)

1956- Ralph Edward Greene

Karl Sinclair Atkinson

1957- Harold Cornelius Haizlip

1959- Raymond Lewis Hayes

Robert Stewart Jason

Lawrence Burwell

1961- Mansfield Castleton Jr. Neal

Alison Stewart

Author, First Class: The Legacy of Dunbar, America's First Black Public High School

"At Dunbar, Jackson taught mathematics and coached sports for 38 years. He served as the school’s principal from 1906 to 1909. He shepherded many of his students to Amherst, which graduated more Dunbar students than any other college outside of the nation’s capital.

It was Jackson who convinced Charles Hamilton Houston, Class of 1915, to attend Amherst."

-"A Slice of History", Evan J. Albright,

Amherst College Magazine (Winter 2007)

• My idea: A scholarship program to invite Dunbar High School juniors to visit Amherst to learn more about the Dunbar-Amherst connection and consider the prospect of a liberal arts college education

Between 1906 and 1961, more than thirty men from Dunbar High School in D.C. enrolled at Amherst College.

For some class years at Amherst, Dunbar High School graduates made up the entire black student population. (1926- 2 students, 1959- 3 students, etc.)

Research Question

The Teachers of Dunbar : Activists and Intellectuals

"Why did so many students from Dunbar High School in D.C. attend Amherst in the first half of the twentieth century?"

Ideas for Future Research

Letter from A. J. Cooper to

W.E.B. Du Bois

2008

"The staff should be highly intelligent and professionally minded with undiminishing interest in educational problems...Social consciousness should be included, for upon the teachers of youth in our peculiar social pattern rests the responsibility of protesting against injustices in the social order."

-"The Philosophy of Dunbar High School"

(November 1944)

• Parallel dynamics at Smith and Mount Holyoke with Dunbar High School graduates
• Amherst College Admission Deans' intentional recruitment from Dunbar
• Amherst's relationship with other high schools and educational institutions throughout its history

1984

Melissa Harris-Perry - Director of the Anna Julia Cooper Center at Wake Forest University

Principals of Dunbar High School (1870-1964)

From The Dunbar Story: 1870-1955 by Mary Gibson Hundley