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With the gradual dismantling of slavery, from President Abraham Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation on 1 January 1863 to the states’ ratification of the Thirteenth Amendment on 6 December 1865, education became a critical step toward self-reliance for the approximately four million freed women and men. Until legislatures in the southern states agreed to fund public education for all citizens, the creation of schools for African Americans was shouldered largely by various northern philanthropic organizations. Fisk University president George Gates recalled the “romantic beginnings” of several early black colleges: Hampton had its heroic early days, gathering round the personality of General Samuel