Black History Knowledge — October 7

What happened on this day. These are the October 7 moments in Black history worth knowing, remembering, and passing on.

1873 — Henry E. Hayne became the first Black student at the University of South Carolina

On October 7, 1873, Henry E. Hayne, a Black man then serving as South Carolina’s Secretary of State, matriculated as a student in the University of South Carolina’s school of medicine. Professors LaBorde, Gibbes and Talley resigned immediately, and the board of trustees placed on record that the resignations were caused solely by Hayne’s race. Other Black students, including state legislators, soon enrolled in the law and medical departments. Hayne’s enrollment integrated South Carolina’s flagship university during Reconstruction, a Black first in higher education in the Deep South.

1875 — Black Georgians opened a state convention in Augusta to refute insurrection charges

On October 7, 1875, a convention of about fifty Black delegates assembled in Augusta, Georgia, to refute charges that Black Georgians intended an insurrection and to decide what course the race should pursue. Henry McNeal Turner attacked the federal government for its conduct toward Black Southerners and recommended emigration to Africa, while others urged remaining in the state. Before adjourning the next day, the convention adopted an address declaring the insurrection reports baseless and stating that the Ku Klux Klan was rampant in Georgia and that Black men were kept off juries and denied the protection of the courts. The Augusta convention is part of the Colored Conventions movement, in which Black Americans organized collectively to defend their rights as Reconstruction was being rolled back.

1963 — Black residents of Selma organized Freedom Day for voting rights

On October 7, 1963, hundreds of Black residents lined up at the Dallas County courthouse on a registration day in an organized action called Freedom Day. Registrars deliberately slowed the process to a few applicants an hour, while Sheriff Jim Clark’s deputies and state troopers kept supporters from bringing food and water to the people waiting in line. Freedom Day revealed how local registrars and state power nullified Black voting rights before the Voting Rights Act. It also strengthened the organizing network that made Selma central to the 1965 campaign.

1993 — Toni Morrison was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature

The Swedish Academy announced Toni Morrison as the 1993 Nobel laureate in literature on October 7, 1993. She became the first Black woman to receive the literature prize. The award placed Morrison’s novels about Black memory, language, history, and interior life at the center of world literature.