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36 The GUIDE to YELLOW SPRINGS 2019 – 20 YELLOW SPRINGS NEWS By YS NEWS STAFF "Struggle is a never ending process. Free- dom is never really won, you earn it and win it in every generation."       —Coretta Scott King, Antioch College Class of 1951 In 1871, a group of female Antioch Col - lege students tried to vote in a protest for women’s suffrage. In 1963, Antioch College students and alumni helped register African-American voters in Mississippi as a part of Freedom Summer. And in 2018, Antioch College board mem - bers and faculty members traveled to the U.S.-Mexico border to aid migrants. In every generation, Antiochians have fought for causes, near and far. Perhaps its progressive spirit can be traced to its first president, Horace Mann, who championed a free, universal public education, and who told graduates in 1859 to “be ashamed to die until you’ve won some victory for humanity.” Proclaimed in one 2000s-era T-shirt as a “Boot camp for the Revolution,” Antioch has long been a focal point for activism in the Yellow Springs and Dayton area. And with varying degrees of success, the college has strived to live up to its own principles, beginning 167 years ago at its founding. Co-educational from the start “Let woman … be educated to the highest practicable point; not only because it is her right, but because it is essential to the world’s progress.”                —Horace Mann In 1850, the vision of Antioch was born in Marion, N.Y., at a convention of the Christian Connexion. And on the same day its delegates voted to establish a college, a committee to plan for the college passed a measure stating, “that this College shall afford equal privileges to students of both sexes,” according to a history of Antioch by Antioch grad R.L. Straker. On Antioch’s Inaugural day in 1853, the college’s first class of eight freshmen included two women, Jane Andrews of Massachusetts and Mahalah Jay of Yellow Springs. While several Midwestern colleges had opened their doors to women, most offered women a watered-down education, such as the “Ladies Department” of Oberlin College, which taught only religion, French and litera- Activism at Antioch: A founding call to ture, according to “The Trouble with Coedu- cation: Mann and the Women at Antioch, 1853–1860,” by John Rury and Glenn Harper. In contrast, women at Antioch studied the same courses as men. While women studied the same courses as men at Antioch, they were not allowed to speak extemporaneously or from memory, which was considered unwomanly, according to Antioch Archivist Scott Sanders. However, an early, prominent student named Olympia Brown challenged that restriction. “When called before the class to recite a paper, she instead delivered a stirring ora - tion with the manuscript rolled tightly in her hand,” Sanders wrote in “Antioch: An Episodic History.” Her bewildered professor had no idea how to stop her from memorizing her papers, and no one else did either.” A news clipping from 1937 highlighted another first, noting that Antioch “was the first college to apply the cooperative plan of work and study to women as well as men, and has been sending girls out on jobs since 1921.” “Jobs held by Antioch women today range from selling toilet goods to making blood- counts, and from teaching under-privileged children to serving as attendants in psychiat - ric hospitals,” the article stated. First female professor Although Antioch was not the first col - lege to admit female students, it can claim to be the first with a female professor on equal standing with her male colleagues. Rebecca Pennell, Mann’s niece, was one of the 10 founding professors of the college. She was listed as a professor of natural and civil history in the college’s first catalogue, in 1853. According to a 1937 news clipping, Pennell also taught at Antioch the first course in didactics ever offered in an institution of college rank. Pennell was the first female to receive both the same rank and pay as her male colleagues. She also participated in faculty meetings. Opportunities for all races A decade after its founding, Antioch officially passed a policy prohibiting racial discrimination in admissions. However, it took almost another century before many black students actually enrolled. At the college board meeting in 1863, trustees passed by a vote of 9–4, “Resolved, That the Trustees of Antioch College cannot, according to the Charter, reject persons on account of color.” In Mann’s day (he died in 1859), some multiracial students reportedly attended the Antioch Preparatory Academy, a high school, according to Sanders. But it was not without pushback. Due to the admission of students of color, then-board president Judge Harlan resigned and removed his own children from the preparatory school, Sanders said. The first students of color to attend the prep school were Fanny and Margaret Hunster, who were from the village and described by sources as “mulatto,” according to Sanders. America Randolph, who was briefly a freshman, was the first college student of color at Antioch. The first such male student was Walthal Wynn. The first gradudate of color was Alfred Hampton, class of 1888. The first woman of color to graduate was Mayme Banks Bowles, class of 1906. But black students were infrequent until a program begun in the 1940s sought to increase their numbers. Jessie Treichler’s Race Relations Committee, established in the 1940s, managed scholarship funds to recruit students like Leon A. Higginbotham, class of 1949, who became a federal judge and the Scott sisters — Edythe and Coretta, according to Sanders. And it wasn’t until 1947 that the first black faculty member was hired — Walter Anderson, professor of music, who chaired the department for 20 years and inspired a generation of musicians. In the 1960s, the Antioch Program for Interracial Education actively recruited stu - dents from diverse backgrounds. According to a founding document, the key elements included, “A renewed commitment by Antioch of social change” and “increased student pluralism through the enrollment of 240 students from low-income, working class, multi- ethnic backgrounds.” Excerpts from articles by Megan Bachman and Diane Chiddister Horace Mann Rebecca Pennell Walter Anderson, Antioch professor of music, was the first African American faculty member to be hired at the college, in 1947. Here, Anderson laughs with First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt in her Manhattan apartment. He performed FDR's D-Day Prayer, which he set to music. In November 2015, more than 100 Antioch College students demonstrated in solidarity with Students chanted, “Black lives matter at Antioch College,” and “We must love and PHOTO BY COURTESY OF ANTIOCHIANA, ANTIOCH C