Martin Freeman
*This date celebrates the birth of Martin Freeman, a Black educator and administrator who was born in 1826.
From Rutland, Vermont, Martin Henry Freeman graduated from Middlebury College as a Salutatorian in 1849. In 1854, he was appointed Professor at the Allegheny Institute near Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, which later became Avery College.
There, he gained a great following in mathematics and science. In 1856, Freeman was appointed President of the school, the first Black man to hold the position of College President in America.
He left the country for Africa in 1864 (he is noted as saying that the move was primarily to protect his family from the "racially oppressive society" he found in Pittsburgh at the time). He spent many years at Liberia College, becoming its President shortly before he died in 1889.
