Famous African American Teachers

Introduction: Dr. Charles K. Ross, Director, African-American Studies
The University of Mississippi

Africans, delivered to America during the 17th, 18th, and 19th centuries, brought with them a commitment to education. This desire for learning caused them to be placed in the difficult position of forcibly learning English but not legally being taught how to read and write. Although caught in this paradox, African Americans such as Jupiter Hammon, Phillis Wheatley, Frederick Douglass, Mary Jane Patterson, and Booker T. Washington all had significant educational accomplishments.

Several African Americans received degrees from white institutions of higher learning during the 19th century and historically black colleges were formed beginning in 1837 with the establishment of Cheyney State Training School in Pennsylvania.

With the end of the Civil War and Reconstruction, African Americans in the South found themselves retrenched to land as sharecroppers and tenant farmers, legally stripped of the right to vote, and socially segregated. Against this backdrop, education became the leading tool in the fight for equal rights politically, economically and socially. The individuals featured during Black History Month by the Center for Excellence in Teaching and Learning represent and epitomize some of the many accomplishments, contributions, and achievements by African American teachers.

Sarah Mapps Douglass, 1806-1882, was an African-American educator and abolitionist. Her family was wealthy and she grew up among Philadelphia's elite. Her grandfather, Cyrus Bustill, was a Black educator and member of the first African-American charity organization, the Free African Society. Her parents were renowned abolitionists Robert Douglass, Sr. and Grace Bustill Douglass.

Sarah became active in the abolitionist movement early in life. Although her family was not allowed to become members of the Society of Friends, Sarah attended Quaker meetings with her mother, where seating was segregated. That experience affected her deeply and she later wrote, "And even when a child, my soul was made sad by hearing five or six times, during the course of our meeting, this language of remonstrance addressed to those who were willing to sit with us. 'This bench is for the black people,' 'This bench is for the people of colour'—and often times I wept, at other times I felt indignant..." (Bacon, 2003).

Sarah was educated by tutors at a newly-established school for colored children. When she was 16, she founded her own school. In 1833, it was taken over by the biracial Philadelphia Female Anti-Slavery Society, of which Sarah was a member. In 1853, Sarah was named head of the girls' preparatory department of the Philadelphia Institute for Colored Youth (pictured), which trained students to become educators. Graduates of the Institute would later be sent to the south to teach in freedom schools after the Civil War.

Sarah was active in educational and community organizations. She taught literature, science and anatomy at the Institute, as well as serving on committees and the Board of Directors. She was a fundraiser for the black press, contributed to the Liberator and the Anglo-African Magazine, and gave numerous public lectures. Sarah Mapps Douglass "lived her life according to her convictions that education would shape a better world for her race and that racism in society had to be eliminated" (Lyman, p. 59, 2005).

References:

Bacon, M. H. (2003). Sarah Mapps Douglass, Faithful Attender Of Quaker Meeting: View from the Back Bench. Philadelphia: Quaker Press.

Lyman, D. (2005). Great African-American Women. NY: Jonathan David.

Sarah Mapps Douglass, 1806-1882. Found online at http://voices.cla.umn.edu/vg/Bios/entries/douglass_sarah_mapps.html.

Archives: Teachers featured earlier this month

John Robert Edward Lee