E’ry day this month, Philly’s 7th Ward, in partnership with the Center for Black Educator Development, will highlight a “Black Educator Hall of Famer.“ But, don’t forget, e’ry month is Black History Month. February is just the Blackest. Every day is an ongoing opportunity to learn and teach the colossal impact Black educators have had on society.
Thomas Ezekiel Miller
Thomas Ezekiel Miller was born on June 17, 1849, in Ferrebeeville, Beaufort County, South Carolina. The historians Eric Foner and Stephen Middleton found that his mother was a Mulatto daughter of Judge Thomas Heyward, Jr., a signer of the Declaration of Independence, and his father was a wealthy young white man, whose family rejected their relationship—they forced Miller’s adoption. He was adopted by former slaves Richard and Mary Ferrebee Miller, who were freed by 1850.
He attended all-Black Public Schools in Charleston and continued his education in Hudson, New York. He graduated from Lincoln University on a scholarship in 1872. He was light enough to have “passed as white” in the North, but he chose to live most of his adult life as a person of color in his native state.
Upon graduation from Lincoln University, Miller returned to South Carolina, where he was appointed School Commissioner of Beauford County. Miller was deeply committed to education and served as a teacher and school administrator. He believed education was key to advancing African Americans.
Miller pivoted to a career in law, politics, and civil rights. He studied law at the recently integrated University of South Carolina. He also studied with the state solicitor and state Supreme Court justice. He was admitted to the bar in December 1875. Miller served in the state general assembly from 1874 to 1880, when he was elected to the state senate.
He was the Republican Party state chairman in 1884, and in 1888, Miller was elected to the U.S. Congress from South Carolina’s heavily African American Second Congressional District. He was one of only five African Americans to serve in Congress during the late 19th century. While in Congress, Miller advocated for civil rights, education, and economic opportunities for African Americans.
After his career in politics came to an end, as a result of Jim Crow politics responsible for Black voter disenfranchisement, Miller returned to education. In March 1896, Miller was appointed the first President of the newly founded State Negro College (later renamed South Carolina State College) in Orangeburg. Miller used the position to promote the employment of African American teachers in the state’s Black public schools.
Miller was a trailblazer for African Americans in politics and education during a time of intense racial discrimination. When he died in 1938, his obituary in the Journal of Negro History described him as “one of the most useful men of his time.”
Happy Black History Month and make sure to read up on Thomas Ezekiel Miller, a member of the Black Educator Hall of Fame.
