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Black students had to fight to study at UT | Opinion

In the fall of 1952, 22-year-old Gene Mitchell Gray, a 1950 graduate of Knoxville College, was admitted to the graduate school at UT.

Robert J. Booker
Columnist
  • Robert J. Booker is a freelance writer and former executive director of the Beck Cultural Exchange Center. He may be reached at 546-1576.

It was 80 years ago — on Tuesday, Sept. 26, 1939 — that six black men applied for admission to the University of Tennessee in what was believed the first move in a possible test case to challenge the 1901 state law that prohibited the mixing of blacks and whites in the same classroom. Represented by attorney Carl A. Cowan, the applicants were Homer L. Saunders, Clinton M. Marsh, Walter S.E. Hardy, Ezra Totten, T.L. Smith and Joseph M. Michael.

Robert J. Booker on March 1, 2010

UT President J.D. Hoskins asked them to wait for the next session of the legislature in 1941 to make further provisions for Negro citizens. He said that $2,500 would be available for their immediate enrollment at other institutions. Cowan rejected the notion and said $2,500 was inadequate to meet the needs of "Tennessee's Negro citizens who seek advanced classes in professional lines." He further stated that they were not attempting to test the existing law.

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Hiding behind an 1881 policy

"All we are asking for is comparable educational facilities in the state," he said.

When the News Sentinel asked Hoskins what UT proposed to do, he replied, "The constitution and the code both forbid it. Of course, we are going to obey the law — the Tennessee law, if my memory serves me right, is a $50 fine and 30 days to six months in jail for violating this law." The men took their case to Knox County Chancery Court and lost.

Melody Banks, a University of Tennessee senior and president of UT's Black Student Union and Women of Promise, speaks during a student protest on campus March 1, 2019.

The policy advocated by Hoskins had been used by the university since Nov. 16, 1881, when 12 black students who had been appointed by state legislators applied for entry.

At that time there was no state law that prohibited their admission. In fact, under the 1869 act that endowed the university as a college of mechanical arts, it required that all students who were qualified be admitted regardless of race or color.

However, the UT board of trustees passed a resolution to appropriate money to pay the fees of "colored students at Fisk College in Nashville," in violation of the intent of the legislature. By 1890 UT made the same arrangements with Knoxville College as the U.S. Congress appropriated money through the Morrill Act to land-grant colleges.

Gene Mitchell Gray

In the fall of 1952, 22-year-old Gene Mitchell Gray, a 1950 graduate of Knoxville College, was admitted to the graduate school at UT to pursue a master's degree in biochemistry. He and three other black men had sought entry to various departments through the courts when UT President Charlie Brehm and the board of trustees announced in January 1952 that blacks would be accepted as graduate students.

A native of Knoxville, Gray had graduated from Swift Memorial Junior College in Rogersville before getting his Bachelor of Science degree at KC. He worked as a bellboy at the Hotel Arnold, where his mother worked as a maid. Both were fired when he entered UT.

Gray left UT after a relatively short time and attended another university. He had opened the door for many other blacks to follow as professors, vice presidents and top administrators. He paved the way for world-class athletes and students of business, science and other professions who have put the University of Tennessee on the academic and sports map. Those events beginning 80 years ago have truly made a difference.

Robert J. Booker is a freelance writer and former executive director of the Beck Cultural Exchange Center. He may be reached at 865-546-1576.