Mercer University

Jesse Mercer , namesake of the university Founding and early years (1833–1959) Woodcut of Mercer University from an 1877 Macon, Georgia city directory. Mercer University was founded in Penfield, Georgia , as a boys' preparatory school under Billington McCarter Sanders, a professor who served as the first president, and Adiel Sherwood, a Baptist minister who previously founded a boys' manual labor school that served as a model. [ 14 ] [ 15 ] The school opened as Mercer Institute with 39 students on January 14, 1833. [ 14 ] The school was named for Jesse Mercer , [ 16 ] a prominent Baptist leader who, along with Josiah Penfield , [ 17 ] provided a founding endowment and who served as the first chairman of the board of trustees . [ 14 ] [ 18 ] The Georgia General Assembly granted a university charter in December 1837. [ 14 ] Mercer adopted its present name in 1838 and graduated its first university class, of three students, in 1841. [ 14 ] In 1871, Mercer moved to Macon , [ 19 ] a center of transportation and commerce in Georgia. The School of Law was established in 1873 and was named the Walter F. George School of Law in 1947 in honor of Mercer alumnus Walter F. George , class of 1901, who served as a United States senator from Georgia and as President pro tempore of the United States Senate . During World War II, Mercer was one of 131 colleges and universities in the V-12 Navy College Training Program , which offered military training that prepared students for a commission in the United States Navy.

Mercer University was the first college or university in Georgia to fully desegregate. [ 33 ] In April 18, 1963, the board of trustees voted 13 to 5, with 3 abstentions, to ratify the policy that "Mercer University considers all applications based on qualification, without consideration of race, color of skin, creed, or origin." [ 33 ] This policy change allowed Sam Oni, a twenty-two-year-old student from Ghana, to become the first Black student to attend Mercer University. [ 34 ] Sam Oni, knowingly and intentionally, in part applied to Mercer for the purpose of helping to end racial segregation in the United States. As Sam Oni phrased it, "My role, as we conceived it was by breaking the color bar at Mercer, I would be challenging our Southern Baptist brothers and sisters in America to confront gross contradictions in the Christian witness at home and abroad." [ 35 ] Sam Oni succeeded despite pressure from segregationists in both the South and the Southern Baptist Convention to keep Mercer racially segregated, including an airplane flying a banner that read "Keep Mercer Segregated" as the Board of Trustees successfully voted to fully integrate. [ 35 ]

In 2006, the Georgia Baptist Convention ( Southern Baptist Convention ) ended its affiliation with Mercer, after 173 years. [ 36 ] [ 37 ] Before the affiliation ended, Mercer had an independent board of trustees; the convention provided financial support but did not control the university. The lack of control caused friction, with Mercer resisting restraints on social issues while the Convention saw Mercer as becoming secularized and not conforming to its values. [ 38 ] The Convention reportedly complained about the presence of a "pro-gay student group" at Mercer, and the university's "support for non-Southern Baptist organizations." [ 39 ] Mercer is currently affiliated with the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship , a more liberal group of Baptists. The denomination's official records are stored at Mercer University, and the university is partnered with the denomination. [ 40 ]

Rev. Billington M. Sanders, Mercer's first president Billington McCarter Sanders (1833–1840) [ 57 ] Otis Smith (1840–1844) [ 58 ] John Leadley Dagg (1844–1854) [ 59 ] Nathaniel Macon Crawford(1854–1856) [ 60 ] Shelton Palmer Sanford (acting President; 1856–1858) [ 61 ] Nathaniel Macon Crawford (1858–1866) [ 60 ] Henry Holcombe Tucker (1866–1871) [ 62 ] Archibald John Battle (1872–1889) [ 63 ] Gustavus Alonzo Nunnally (1889–1893) [ 64 ] Joseph Edgerton Willet (acting President; 1893) [ 65 ] James Bruton Gambrell (1893–1896) [ 66 ] Pinckney Daniel Pollock (1896–1903) [ 67 ] William Heard Kilpatrick (acting President; 1903–1905) [ 68 ] Charles Lee Smith (1905–1906) [ 69 ] Samuel Young Jameson (1906–1913) [ 70 ] James Freeman Sellers (acting President; 1913–1914) [ 71 ] William Lowndes Pickard (1914–1918) [ 72 ] Rufus Washington Weaver (1918–1927) [ 73 ] Andrew Phillip Montague (acting President; 1927–1928) [ 74 ] Spright Dowell (1928–1953) [ 75 ] George Boyce Connell (1953–1959) [ 76 ] Spright Dowell (interim President; 1959–1960) [ 75 ] Rufus Carrollton Harris (1960–1979) [ 77 ] Raleigh Kirby Godsey (1979–2006) [ 78 ] William D. Underwood (2006–present) [ 79 ]