The Path to Founding an HBCU
Born into slavery, William Hooper Councill founded one of the nation's first HBCUs, Alabama AaM University. Negotiating the racial politics of Reconstruction and the dawn of Jim Crow was dangerous work. Councill was a peer of Booker T. Washington's and is remembered for his accommodating stance toward whites. His complicated story helps us understand the times he lived in and the legacy of HBCUs.