Education

The Johnson Bible College was founded as the "School of the Evangelists" in 1893 by Ashley S. Johnson at Kimberlin Heights (approximately twelve miles southeast of Knoxville). Johnson, a Knox County native and successful evangelist, author, and educator, transformed his…

Charles S. Johnson, distinguished sociologist and African American leader, was born in 1893 in Bristol, Virginia. He was educated at Wayland Academy in Richmond, Virginia Union University, and the University of Chicago, where he undertook graduate work with the distinguished…

Fisk Free School opened its doors in January 1866 in Nashville near what is today the site of Union Station. At the time, the campus's only buildings consisted of small, wooden hospital barracks originally built to serve Union soldiers who…

In 1871, only four years after the incorporation of Fisk Free School as Fisk University in Nashville, the school for emancipated African Americans faced impending closure. Classrooms and living quarters continued to be housed in the decaying barracks of the…

Sears, Roebuck and Company magnate Julius Rosenwald created the Julius Rosenwald Fund (JRF) in 1917 to coordinate his contributions for African American education. Guided by Booker T. Washington, Rosenwald supported the expansion of public education for rural southern blacks within…

This lawsuit filed by several African American families in 1955 to desegregate the Nashville public schools dramatically altered education patterns, and its various remedies continue to generate debate. The longest-running case in Tennessee history (the federal court in Nashville still…

The Holston Presbytery founded King College in 1867 in Bristol and named the school for James King, an eighteenth-century settler in the region. Both the acreage and physical plant of the college have more than doubled in 130 years. The…

Immediately after the Civil War, scores of northern missionaries traveled south to educate the newly freed slaves. These missionary efforts resulted in the establishment of a number of black colleges and universities. One of these schools was Knoxville College, a…

On December 2, 1843, the Memphis Conference of the Methodist Episcopal Church received a charter from the Tennessee General Assembly authorizing the establishment of a young women's preparatory school and college to be named the Memphis Conference Female Institute (MCFI).…

In 1882 Lane College, then the "C.M.E. High School," was founded by the Colored Methodist Episcopal Church (now Christian Methodist Episcopal Church, CME) in America. Initially Bishop William Henry Miles, the first bishop of the CME Church, presided over the…

Fourth bishop of the Colored (Christian) Methodist Episcopal Church, Isaac Lane was born March 4, 1834, in Madison County. Lane grew to manhood as a slave on the plantation of Cullen Lane. At age nineteen Isaac Lane married Frances Ann…

Albert Miller Lea, a prominent chief engineer of the State of Tennessee, was born in Knoxville in 1805. Lea learned his engineering skills in the army. He entered West Point and graduated fifth in a class of thirty-three in 1831.…

On January 1, 1918, 12 students from four states met with Nora Chambers in an upstairs room of the Church of God Publishing House in Cleveland, Tennessee. This first class meeting of the Church of God's Bible Training School (BTS)…

Memphis's Lemoyne Owen College opened its doors in 1871 as LeMoyne Normal and Commercial School, but it traces its ancestry to the schools for ex-slaves organized by members of the American Missionary Association (AMA) during and after the Civil War.…

Although Tennessee libraries developed slowly from early statehood until the twentieth century, early Tennesseans placed a high value on their collections of books. Given the demands of frontier life and the relatively high cost of books, it is not surprising…

In 1897 the Reverend Arthur A. Myers, his wife Ellen, and General O. O. Howard founded a mountain school that expanded to become an accredited four-year institution, Lincoln Memorial University. Supported by the American Missionary Association, the Reverend and Mrs.…

John B. Lindsley was a significant nineteenth-century educator, physician, Presbyterian minister, author, and civic leader in Nashville. He was born in Princeton, New Jersey, and came to Tennessee with his family at the age of two when his father, Philip…

Philip Lindsley, an educator, Presbyterian minister, and classical scholar, was born in Basking Ridge, New Jersey. He was educated at private academies and at the College of New Jersey (now Princeton University) and joined the faculty as Latin and Greek…

The roots of Lipscomb University date to October 5, 1891, when David Lipscomb and James A. Harding established the Nashville Bible School. Lipscomb and Harding believed there was a need for a school that would prepare students completely through high…

David Lipscomb, a famous and influential second generation Stone-Campbell Movement leader, was born in Franklin County. Educated at Franklin College in Nashville, he matriculated between 1846 and 1849. Tolbert Fanning baptized Lipscomb while he was a student at the college,…