In 1879, Penn enrolled Black students for the first time in its history — William Adger, Nathan Francis Mossell, and James Brister. However, it wasn’t until national cries for equality during the civil rights movement of the 1960s that Penn began to dramatically increase the number of admitted Black students. In student organizations and clubs, Black students organized for the implementation of cultural centers, academic programs, and other community-focused initiatives. Now, 146 years after the first Black students were admitted, let’s take a look at the history of students and faculty activism to combat racism and spotlight Black identity at Penn. 

April 8, 1968

The campus mourned the death of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. with a 60-person vigil hosted by the Society for African and Afro-American Students, a precursor to Penn’s Black Student League. After the vigil — which took place in Houston Hall — a group of students marched up Walnut Street, across 37th Street, and down Spruce Street, with songs and speeches featured throughout the rally. The march ended with a memorial service at Irvine Auditorium conducted by Rev. Stanley E. Johnson, the university chaplain at the time, where over 2,500 students, faculty, and administration gathered to grieve. 

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Nov. 9, 1979

75 students marched from high rise field to College Hall to protest campus racism after an incident at the Kappa Sigma fraternity house where brothers dressed up as Ku Klux Klan members for a costume party. 1981 College graduate Russell Brooks, then chair of the BSL, spoke to the crowd in front of the fraternity house and emphasized that the purpose of the protest was to organize and unite Black students on campus.

February 1985

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On Feb. 9, 1985, the BSL held an eight-hour vigil where over 300 attendees gathered on former Penn President Francis Sheldon Hackney’s lawn. The protest was held in support of a petition signed by 109 members of Penn’s faculty, administration, and staff calling for mandatory University-wide racism workshops, an increase in minority faculty members, and for racist professors to be appropriately punished. 

On Feb. 13, the BSL held a sit-in during a legal studies class in response to allegations of racist harassment from Wharton lecturer Murray Dolfman. On Feb. 19, the BSL held a meeting with Hackney to discuss Dolfman’s actions, but the students walking out said they were “talking to a stone wall.” 

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In a statement published on Feb. 21, the University said that the BSL had "brought forward sharply and clearly a number of real concerns on this campus” and assured students that “other steps will be taken to assure that racial diversity is maintained.”

April 16, 1993

Nearly 14,000 copies of The Daily Pennsylvanian were stolen in a protest against “the blatant and voluntary perpetuation of institutional racism against the Black Community by the DP” and the University. Several students were taken into custody and questioned by the Penn Police, but no one was held criminally responsible. Hackney declared that any further violation of the University’s open expression policies would be investigated. 

December 1993

In the third edition of “Separation Anxiety,” a four-part DP feature on racial attitudes at Penn, the authors detailed the experience of “choosing sides” at the 1920 Commons dining hall. Students faced a decision between sitting on the “Black” side and the “white” side, an unspoken phenomenon that was often overlooked, but very present. Many students expressed that this was a visual manifestation of a deeply rooted racial separation on campus. 

Feb. 13, 1995

Kwame Ture, formerly known as Stokely Carmichael, spoke to an audience of 200 at Irvine Auditorium amidst racial tension and concern over nationwide affirmative action policies. Ture played a major role in the civil rights movement and advocated for a complete revolution and overthrow of the American capitalist society during his speech at Penn. He called for students to actively and consciously participate in the revolution.

“Just saying you are against something doesn’t do anything,” Ture said. “It is what you are for.”

Oct. 19, 1995

The Million Man March was a large gathering of Black men at the National Mall in Washington, D.C. to unite against social inequality. 1998 Wharton graduate Brandale Randolph, W.E.B. Du Bois College House desk receptionist Stephanie Robinson, and 1998 Engineering graduate Anthony Crawford are just a few of the many Penn community members who attended the march. In an interview, Crawford said it was powerful to “see African Americans sharing brotherly love like [this].” Estimates of the crowd size ranged from 400,000-870,000. 

January 2001

In January of 2001, the ARCH building became home to Penn’s umbrella organization for African diaspora student groups, UMOJA. At the ribbon-cutting ceremony, then-Penn President Judith Rodin said “UMOJA will help make Penn become a more dynamic university” through increased collaboration with the other minority cultural groups already housed at ARCH. 2003 college graduate and then-UMOJA board member Kimberly Noble said the office would aid the organization’s agenda “to strengthen the political voice of students of the African diaspora on campus.”

Sept. 24, 2002

Penn community members gathered to celebrate the opening of the Center for Africana Studies. The center was designed to combine the Afro-American Studies program with the Center for the Study of Black Literature and Culture. The Center has since provided numerous opportunities for education about the African American experience and the African diaspora. The center is dedicated to “fostering a deeper understanding of the peoples of Africa and their diasporas,” further integrating African American and Africana studies to the realm of academia. 

Feb. 17, 2012

Appointed to the Wharton School of Business from 1896-1897, W.E.B. Du Bois taught sociology at Penn. During his time at Penn, he wrote the sociological classic "The Philadelphia Negro: A Social Study," the first sociological case study of a Black community in the United States. The College House named in his honor opened in 1972 and is the first of its kind to offer its own endowed scholarship, made possible by the Black Alumni Society. On Feb. 17, 2012, Du Bois was awarded a posthumous honorary professorship. 

June 2020

In 2020, after the death of George Floyd and other Black people at the hands of police, protests across the nation sparked a movement for racial justice. On Penn’s campus and in Philadelphia, protests lasted for more than a week straight. Some of the actions organized by Penn students and faculty included a peaceful protest near the President’s home on June 2, 2020 and a walkout against racial inequality in the healthcare system on June 5, 2020.

April 28, 2021

More than 300 Philadelphia and Penn community members gathered outside the Penn Museum and the President’s house to demand the immediate return of the remains of Tree and Delisha Africa, victims of the 1985 MOVE bombing. MOVE, a Black liberation advocacy group, organized the protest with Black Lives Matter Philadelphia following the discovery that the Penn Museum was in possession of the remains of Tree Africa. In 2024, museum staff found remains matching records for Delisha Africa. 

From silent sit-ins to educational workshops to citywide rallies, Black Penn community members have organized against racism and inequality throughout the decades.