Brief History of Students of Color at Princeton

The first ethnic minority to matriculate at Princeton was Jacob Wooley, a Delaware Indian, member of the Class of 1762. He was followed by two more tribal Delaware men in the Classes of 1776 and 1789. The Continental Congress paid the tuition of one of these students, George Morgan White Eyes, in what may be the first instance of U.S. federal aid to education. Three Cherokee men graduated in the 19th century, and a Choctaw was a member of the Class of 1863. A Seneca and a Sioux graduated in the Classes of 1901 and 1923.

From November 1774 until at least April 1776, two Africans, John Quamine and Bristol Yamma, were tutored in Princeton by Princeton's President Witherspoon to prepare for matriculation in the college. Though the records are fragmentary, John Chavis, a free black who became a noted Latinist and tutor to prominent North Carolinians, is probably the first African American to matriculate at Princeton, in the Class of 1795. In 1945, when Princeton incorporated a Navy ROTC program into its curriculum and accepted the Navy’s officer candidates as matriculated students, African Americans re-entered the Princeton undergraduate body. The first African American to receive a Princeton degree was John Howard, of the Class of 1947, who went on to receive an M.D. from Columbia University. In the 1960s, the University launched concerted efforts to attract African Americans.

Hikoichi Orita of the Class of 1876 was probably the first Asian to graduate from Princeton. He later served as president of the Third Imperial College for some 20 years. Hideomaro Okuma, of the Class of 1878, later served as a member of the Japanese Diet, and Aisaku Nakagawa, of the Class of 1889, pursued a career in medicine. These alumni are representative of the Japanese nationals who began attending Princeton in the last quarter of the 19th century. Chinese nationals did not matriculate at Princeton until the early part of the 20th century. Hsu Ku Kwong, of the Class of 1914, was the first student from China. He returned to Shanghai to pursue a dual career as diplomat and business leader. The Class of 1915 included three Chinese nationals: Kenyon Vanlee Dzung, Han Liang Huang, and Ken Wang. Perhaps the most renowned Asian student at Princeton in the early 20th century was Syngman Rhee, who — after completing a Ph.D. here in 1910 — went on to lead the struggle for Korean independence and then became the first president of South Korea. The Graduate School attracted a number of Chinese and Japanese nationals in the first three decades of the 20th century. The Class of 1923 included Luciano Abut Galimpan from the Philippines and Boon Choey Pitrachat from Thailand, then known as Siam.

The first Asian-American undergraduate was probably Yeiichi Kuwayama, a Japanese American born in New York City, who graduated with the Class of 1940, and pursued a career with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. He was followed in the Class of 1946 by Calvin Allen Lang, a Chinese American from Portland, Oregon, who became a biochemistry professor in the School of Medicine at the University of Louisville, Kentucky.

Pedro Pioseco of the Class of 1888, a Cuban who pursued a career as a Protestant minister, is thought to be the first Hispanic student at Princeton. Jose Romero and Enrique Ybanez, both from Mexico, were members of the Class of 1843. Romero went on to serve three terms in the Mexican Congress. Harold Medina, Class of 1909, was one of the earliest Mexican American undergraduates; he went on to a distinguished career as a judge in the federal court. In the 1960s, Latino and Hispanic students regularly began matriculating at Princeton.

top | July 2007