A summary of the Historically
Black Colleges and Universities (HBCU’s) in Texas, listed in chronological
order. There have been eleven but two are now closed.
1872 – Paul Quinn College (Dallas) was founded as the
“Correctional High School and Institute” in Austin by the AME Church. It moved
to Waco in 1877 and was known as Waco College until it took its current name in
honor of Rev. William Paul Quinn, Senior Bishop of the AME Church, who
organized funding for church-sponsored schools during the years after the Civil
War. In 1990 PQC relocated to Dallas at the former Bishop College campus. HBCU Digest named PQC
2011 HBCU of the Year, and in 2012 PQC President Michael J. Sorrell was named
HBCU Male President of the Year. PQC is also home to the WE over ME Farm, which was
created in the unused football field to bring vegetables to the South Dallas
food desert.
1873 – Wiley College (Marshall) was founded by the Methodist
Episcopal Church and named after Bishop Isaac Wiley who supervised educational
boards of the church. Wiley is best known for its debate teams of the 1930’s, winning
against National Champion USC in 1935 under the leadership of Melvin Tolson.
This victory was the basis for the 2007 film The Great Debaters in which Denzel
Washington portrayed Dr. Tolson. Another prominent faculty member at the time
was religion and philosophy professor J. Leonard Farmer, the first African
American in Texas to hold a PhD. Dr. Farmer was the father of Wiley debater and
civil rights leader James L. Farmer, Jr., founder of the Congress of Racial
Equality (CORE) and organizer of the Freedom Rides during the summer of 1961.
In addition to Farmer, notable alumni include chemist Henry Cecil McBay and
Herman Sweatt, plaintiff in the landmark case of Sweatt vs. Painter which he
filed after being denied admission to the University of Texas Law School.
1873 – Prairie View A&M was founded as “Alta Vista Agricultural and
Mechanical College for Colored Youth” on the site of the old Alta Vista
plantation near Prairie View, 50 miles northwest of Houston, as part of what is
now Texas A&M University. There were only 8 students the first year, after
which it became primarily a teacher’s college known as Prairie View Normal
Institute. The first commencement speaker was Booker T. Washington in June
1897. In 1945 it became Prairie View University, and in 1973 Prairie View
A&M University, an independent unit of the A&M system. PVAMU was the
first HBCU to create and play in a football bowl game, and its teams have
regularly led the SWAC in many sports. Some outstanding alumni are MLB first
baseman and manager Cecil Cooper, NLF Hall of Famer Ken Houston, UNCF founder
Frederick Paterson, and Inez Prosser, a 1913 graduate who was the first African
American woman to earn a doctorate in psychology. Actor Mr. T also attended but
did not graduate.
1881 – A forerunner of Huston-Tillotson University (Austin) was founded
by the American Missionary Society of Congregational Churches as “Tillotson
College and Normal Institute”. It merged with Methodist-affiliated Samuel
Huston College (founded 1900) to become Huston-Tillotson College in 1952.
Jackie Robinson was the baseball coach
in 1944 and 1945. Alumni include Azie Morton Taylor, US Treasurer during the
Clinton Administration, as well as United Methodist clergy members Zan Holmes
(former professor at SMU’s Perkins School of Theology and long-time Dallas
civil rights activist) and Cecil Williams (retired pastor of Glade Memorial UMC
in San Francisco).
1881 – Bishop College was founded in Marshall by the Baptist Home
Mission Society during a movement led by Nathan Bishop, a New England school
administrator, to provide education for African American Baptist youth in the
South. During a denominational meeting in Philadelphia, Bishop received a
pledge from the president of Baylor University to create a school in Texas. It
became known for its 2-year ministry program, and moved to Dallas in 1961 where
enrollment grew, peaking at 2,000 students in 1970. Bishop lost its
accreditation and was forced to close in 1988.
1884 – Guadalupe College was founded in Seguin by the Texas Missionary
Baptist General Convention. It closed in 1936 after a fire in the main
building.
1894 – Texas College (Tyler) was founded by the CME church. It was
briefly known as Phillips University (1909 – 1912) in honor of Bishop Henry
Phillips. It housed one campus of Tyler Junior College from 1946 to 1966 and is
best known for its teacher training programs.
1898 – St. Philip’s College was founded in San Antonio as an outreach
ministry of St. Philip’s Episcopal Church. Artemensia Bowden, the daughter of
former slaves, joined the faculty as a teacher and administrator in 1902; under
her leadership SPC went from an industrial school for girls to a high school
and, in 1927, a junior college. It ended its Episcopalian ties in 1942 when it
became part of the San Antonio Community College System, serving San Antonio’s
black community until the system was integrated in 1950.
1912 – Jarvis Christian College ( Hawkins) was founded by a joint
effort between the Christian Woman’s Board of Missions and the Negro Disciples
of Christ. It is located on land donated by James and Ida Van Zandt Jarvis,
also benefactors of TCU. Jarvis began by offering high school courses, adding
junior college courses in 1927 and upper division courses in 1938. Oil
discovered on campus land in the 1940’s provided income for several decades. It
is the only remaining college of the 12 founded by the Disciples of Christ.
1927 – Texas Southern University was founded in Houston as “Houston
Colored Junior College” by the Houston
School District concurrently with a junior college for white students, and became
a four-year school in 1934. For the previous three years, Wiley College in Marshall had operated an extension in Houston for teacher training. When Heman Sweatt filed suit after being denied
admittance to the University of Texas Law School in 1946, the court granted a
continuance for six months to allow the state to create a law school for black
students. This was done by assuming control of Houston Colored College and
renaming it Texas State University for Negroes with the requirement of teaching
"pharmacy, dentistry, arts and sciences, journalism education, literature,
law, medicine and other professional courses," stipulating that
"these courses shall be equivalent to those offered at other institutions
of this type supported by the State of Texas." (The US Supreme
Court later ruled that the facilities and distance from other law students did
not provide an equal education and Sweatt was admitted to UT.) Despite TSU’s
Jim Crow beginnings (“for Negroes” was dropped from the name in 1951) it has
become a nationally respected institution, ranking fourth in the number of
doctoral and professional degrees granted to African Americans. Alumni include
legislators Barbara Jordan and Mickey Leland, saxophonist Kirk Whalum, and
gospel singer Yolanda Adams.
1948 –
Southwestern Christian College (Terrell) was founded in Fort Worth by the
Church of Christ as “Southwestern Bible Institute”. Two years later it
relocated to the Terrell property vacated by the Texas Military Academy and
took its current name. The campus contains the first building
erected in Terrell, an octagonal-shaped house (despite its shape it was called
a "Round House") to give better protection against Indians. The house
contained the first glass windows in Kaufman County and is one of only twenty
surviving Round Houses in the country.
Sources: Wikipedia, Texas State Historical Association, college
websites when available
