The History of Lincoln University: The Nation's First HBCU
When people talk about the roots of Black higher education in America, the conversation starts in one place: Lincoln University of Pennsylvania. As the nation's first degree-granting Historically Black College and University, Lincoln didn't just open a door — it built the doorway that generations would walk through.
At That Lincoln Life, every piece we make carries this history. So let's tell it properly.
It started as Ashmun Institute
Lincoln University received its charter from the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania on April 29, 1854 — originally established as Ashmun Institute, named after Jehudi Ashmun, a leader tied to the founding of Liberia.[1][2] The school was the vision of John Miller Dickey, a Presbyterian minister, and his wife, Sarah Emlen Cresson.[1]
The spark was personal: when a freedman named James Amos was denied admission to other schools because of his race, Dickey taught him himself — an act of refusing a closed door that became the founding spirit of the institution.[3]
Lincoln's first African American president, Horace Mann Bond, described it as the first institution found anywhere in the world to provide higher education in the arts and sciences for young men of African descent.[1]
Why “Lincoln”?
On April 4, 1866 — just after the Civil War — Ashmun Institute was renamed Lincoln University in honor of President Abraham Lincoln, in recognition of his role in the emancipation of enslaved Americans.[1][2]
A legacy that shaped the world
In its first hundred years, Lincoln educated roughly twenty percent of the African American physicians and more than ten percent of the African American attorneys in the United States.[4] Its alumni roster includes:
- Thurgood Marshall (Class of 1930) — first African American U.S. Supreme Court Justice and lead attorney in Brown v. Board of Education.[2][4]
- Langston Hughes (Class of 1929) — celebrated Harlem Renaissance poet.[2][4]
- Kwame Nkrumah — first Prime Minister of independent Ghana.[2]
- Nnamdi Azikiwe — first President of independent Nigeria.[2]
Lincoln graduates also went on to found other HBCUs across the South.[5]
Lincoln today
Located on a 422-acre campus in Chester County, Pennsylvania, Lincoln has been a public, state-related institution since 1972.[6] Its teams are the Lions, its colors are Orange and Blue, and its motto endures: “If the Son shall make you free, ye shall be free indeed.”[6]
More than 170 years after that first charter, Lincoln is still doing what it was built to do.
Wear the legacy
At That Lincoln Life, we're proud alumni who believe this history is worth carrying — literally. Our Orange & Blue apparel is a way to rep the first degree-granting HBCU wherever you go.
Lincoln made. Lincoln proud.
Sources
- Lincoln University, “History.” lincoln.edu/about/history
- HISTORY.com, “First HBCU, Lincoln University, chartered.” history.com
- Pennsylvania Center for the Book, “Freedom at The Lincoln University.” pabook.libraries.psu.edu
- Encyclopedia.com, “Lincoln University.” encyclopedia.com
- Sasaki, “Planning the Future of the Past at Lincoln University.” sasaki.com
- Wikipedia, “Lincoln University (Pennsylvania).” en.wikipedia.org