Albany State University: Founded in 1903
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Founded in 1903 - Location: Albany, Georgia
Albany State University was founded in 1903, as the Albany Bible and Manual Training Institute. It was established to provide “religious and basic education, as well as teacher training” to Black citizens in Albany.
As the school grew, it eventually received support from the state of Georgia and became a part of the University System of Georgia. In 2015, the Board of Regents of the University System of Georgia voted to have the local Darton State College join and be merged with Albany State University. Today the university combines the best of both institutions, while remaining true to its long and storied traditions.
But the story of any institution is also told through the experiences of its people.
In 1959, Annette Jones, a young lady who would later be elected Miss Albany State College, was at a drive-in restaurant in Albany. She and two other students, Yvonne Taylor and Khalilah Bailey went to the window to get their food. When they got their food, Annette said that she didn’t want to eat in the car and she didn’t want to eat while they are driving back. So, she said, “I want to sit on the benches over there.”
Her friend said, “You know that’s not for you.”
Annette replied, “I don’t know that, there are no signs.”
They went over to the benches and sat down and began eating. The manager, and people inside the restaurant, were staring at them. Finally, a limousine came around and circled them twice. Then the chauffeur got out and went to the manager. Then the manager came over to them and said, “ I appreciate your business but we don’t get enough business from ya’ll for me to upset my regular customers.”
Annette said, “Okay.”
The manager went back inside and Yvonne and Khalilah started gathering up their stuff, when Annette said,” We’re not going anywhere,.…”
She finished eating her food and never came back to the restaurant, even after it was de-segregated.
That was the kind of activism and fight for justice that was in the minds and hearts of many students in Albany in the 1950s and early 1960s. So, when the civil rights fight came to Albany, Georgia, front-and-center, students at Albany State College were in the thick of it—including Annette Jones.
National organizations like the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC), Martin Luther King, Jr. and the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, and more came to Albany as students there, and adults, tried to challenge segregation that still existed on interstate buses.
It’s one thing for the Federal Government to say that segregation should not exist, it’s another thing entirely to enforce it.
Here, Annette Jones, and other students at Albany State were active in protests at bus depots and on city streets. The students were arrested for disturbing the peace, for trying to buy tickets at a whites-only bus counter, for example.
William Dennis, who was the president of Albany State at the time, had to decide whether to support the students or to bend to the pressure from outside of the college. Dennis chose to expel some 40 Albany State students, including Annette Jones who was to become Miss Albany State at the time.
Annette Jones and students like, Bernice Johnson Reagon, were forced to leave Albany State…some lost their scholarships and others went on to other HBCUs to graduate.
Fifty years later, under new president, Everette J. Freeman, Albany State University invited members or representatives, of all of the expelled students it could find, back to Albany State and gave them honorary degrees.
Bernice Johnson Reagon, one of Albany’s most distinguished former students and founder of the well-known freedom-singing group, Sweet Honey in the Rock, said of her experiences in Albany:
“All around me people were getting arrested, beaten, losing their jobs. I thought those of us who were fighting the legal system would have to pay the consequences. I was so clear that I was going to walk this particular journey. There were quite a few of us who were not deterred. We just keep looking for ways to help push and build a movement in southwest Georgia.”
References:
Albany State University. History of Albany State University. Accessed October 4, 2022. https://www.asurams.edu/history.php
Coley, Gwendolyn. Albany State Awards Honorary Degrees to 32 Students Expelled for 1961 Protests. February 13, 20212. Diverse Issues in Higher Education. Accessed October 4, 2022.
National Park Service. Freedom Riders (National Monument - Alabama). History & Culture. Accessed October 4, 2022. https://www.nps.gov/frri/learn/historyculture.htm
The National Center for Civil and Human Rights - Atlanta, Georgia. Annette Jones-White - “Arctic Bear”. pdf. Retrieved October 4, 2022.
The Martin Luther King, Jr. Research and Education Institute. Stanford University. Albany Movement: November 17, 1961. Accessed October 4, 2022.