Silas Herbert Hunt

Silas Herbert Hunt pioneered the integration of higher education in Arkansas and the South, enrolling at the University of Arkansas School of Law in 1948 and becoming the first African-American student to successfully seek admission to a Southern university since Reconstruction. Hunt was born to Jessie Gulley Moton and R.D. Hunt on March 1, 1922, in the community of Red Bluff near Ashdown, Arkansas. He earned distinction as president of Booker T. Washington High School in Texarkana and graduated as class salutatorian in 1941. Hunt enrolled in the Agricultural, Mechanical, and Normal College at Pine Bluff, now known as the University of Arkansas at Pine Bluff, but his studie were interrupted when he was drafted into the U.S. Army during the Second World War. He served with construction engineers in Europe for nearly two years before being, wounded at the Battle of the Bulge. Returning to the United States, he finished his Bachelor of Arts in English in 1947. Although Hunt had been accepted for admission at the University of Indiana, he was inspired to change course by a classmate, Ada Lois Sipuel, who was then pursuing legal action to overturn the University of Oklahoma's policy against admission of Black students. Hunt decided to seek admission to the University of Arkansas. On February 2, 1948, Hunt – accompanied by classmate Wiley Branton, attorney Harold Flowers, and photographer Geleve Grice – met with Robert Leflar, dean of the University of Arkansas School of Law, who reviewed Hunt's academic record and admitted him to the law school. Hunt's instruction was initially segregated from white students, although white students often sat in on his class. By mid summer of that year Hunt had, contracted tuberculosis, and he died nine months later on April 22, 1949, at the Veteran's Hospital in Springfield, Missouri. He is buried at Stateline Cemetery in Texarkana. Campus officials described Hunt as a confidant and intelligent student whose sensitive way of dealing with others dampened the embers of conflict before they gained flame. His pioneering achievement soon led to the admission of other African American students at the University of Arkansas and set in motion the eventual racial integration of universities across the southern United States. In honor of his achievements, the University of Arkansas awarded Hunt a posthumous law degree in 2008 and created a legacy award to recognize the achievements of African American alumni, faculty and staff who have contributed significantly to the betterment of Arkansas and the nation.