Albert Bushnell Hart (1854-1943) was a historian and belonged to the first generation of professionally-trained historians in the United States. Originally from Pennsylvania, Hart grew up in Cleveland and graduated from West High School. A faculty member at Harvard University for forty-three years, Hart occasionally served as the advisor for Black students, including civil rights activist and scholar W.E.B. Du Bois. Hart continued to support Du Bois’ work throughout his life. Hart also served as a trustee of Howard University, a historically Black university.

While at Harvard, Hart publicly opposed the university’s policy of banning Black students from the dormitories. However, in Hart’s letter opposing this policy, he wrote: “I have been convinced for years . . . that the Negro race, as a race, is inferior to the white, and that a mixture of the races in the South or elsewhere would mean a decline in civilization. Furthermore, I have felt and said in my book [The Southern South], that I feel the South was justified in using whatever means were necessary to prevent a union of the races.”

During the Brownsville affair (1906), an incident of racial discrimination when white residents of Brownsville, Texas, accused the members of the African-American 25th Infantry Regiment of violence against two white men, Hart believed the Black soldiers were guilty. He wrote to President Theodore Roosevelt and applauded Roosevelt’s decision to discharge the African- American troops without honor, despite the assertions of white commanders that all members of the regiment had been in the barracks when the violence occurred. In his letter to Roosevelt, Hart wrote: “I feel a profound interest in the welfare and in the future of the Negro race and nobody resents more strongly any injustice done to that race.” Roosevelt’s decision cost 167 men their pensions and prevented them from serving in federal civil service jobs.

Race and gender identity: white, male

Louis Agassiz (1807-1873)

Louis Agassiz was a Swiss biologist and geologist who contributed to the fields of zoology and geology and founded the study of glaciology. Agassiz resisted accepting Charles Darwin’s theory of evolution even after it was generally accepted by the scientific community. Agassiz also subscribed to the theory of polygenism, a belief that human races had different origins and were genetically distinct. To support this theory, Agassiz used racist reasoning and argued that non-white races were inferior to whites. Agassiz’s theories were often used by slaveholders and white supremacists to defend their beliefs. While a professor at Harvard University (1847-73), Agassiz tried to prevent Jewish and Irish students from enrolling.

Race and gender identity: white, male

Patrick Henry (1736-1799)

Patrick Henry was one of the Founding Fathers of the United States. He served as a delegate to the First and Second Continental Congresses (1774, 1775) and as Governor of Virginia (1776-79, 1784-86). Despite speaking publicly against slavery, Henry enslaved people throughout his adult life and stated it would be a “general inconvenience” not to enslave people. At the time of his death, Henry enslaved a total of 112 people. He willed sixty-seven enslaved people to his wife and sons rather than emancipating them. Henry also opposed the adoption of the Constitution of the United States on the grounds that Northerners would use the new powers of Congress to abolish slavery.

Race and gender identity: white, male

Thomas Jefferson (1743-1826)

Thomas Jefferson was one of the Founding Fathers of the United States and third president of the United States (1801-09). He also served as second vice president of the United States (1797-1801) and the first secretary of state (1790-93). He was the principal author of the Declaration of Independence.

Jefferson opposed slavery and advocated for gradual abolition while also enslaving over 600 people throughout his life. He believed that Blacks were racially inferior to whites and advocated that emancipated Blacks should be deported to Africa or the West Indies. Jefferson was the father of at least six children with Sally Hemings, the enslaved half-sister of Jefferson’s wife, Martha. Jefferson continued to hold his children with Hemings in bondage. Although historians are conflicted over the nature of Jefferson and Hemings’ relationship, as an enslaved woman, Sally Hemings had no legal rights.

Race and gender identity: white, male