UK's Legacy of Identifying with the Old South and the Confederacy

Race has played an integral role in the history of the University of Kentucky.  African-Americans helped construct the university’s original buildings.  But unfortunately, the history of African-Americans and UK mirrors the discrimination and slow transition to equality witnessed in the larger American culture. 

During the 1920s and 1930s the UK campus witnessed an increasing interest in the ante-bellum south and glorification of the Civil War.   The 1928 Kentuckian was dedicated to Jefferson Davis, describing him as a “soldier, gentleman, and President of the Southern Confederation.”

1928 Kentuckian dedication

The new-found fascination with the Confederacy continued into the 1930s perhaps, in part, as a result from the publication of Margaret Mitchell's Gone with the Wind, the best-selling novel of 1936, and one of the best-selling books of all time.  John Marsh, Mitchell's spouse, graduated from UK and the connection was widely publicized on campus and across the commonwealth.

As the students’ fascination with all things southern increased, so did their fascination with race.  Kentucky Kernel writers increasingly sought out long-time African-American UK employees like Pierre Whiting and wrote feature stories which usually quoted the workers in dialect, stressing the employee's life-long dedication to the institution.

 

Pierre Whiting

Dean Sarah Blanding, Dean of Women was a self-proclaimed "liberal" on the question of race.  Blanding’s family had very southern roots and while living in Lexington the Blanding’s employed a live-in African-American maid.  Blanding's position on race was most likely heavily influenced by her mentor, Frances Jewell McVey, who as an elected member of the Lexington school board during the 1930s supported better educational opportunities for African-Americans. 

Blanding resisted employing African-Americans in the women's dormitory food services.  However, in the mid-30s she succumbed to pressure to replace "student waitresses by negro [sic] girls."  Blanding justified the change because it allowed students to work on other campus projects while it provided jobs to eighteen African-American women "who might not have found employment otherwise."  Blanding found the new arrangement to be economical and "much more satisfactory."

In addition, the sitting room in Patterson Hall, the women’s dormitory, was redecorated to more closely resemble an ante-bellum southern parlor.  And, over a decade earlier the UK athletic teams had joined the Southern Conference.  Kentucky’s land-grant university founded at the close of the Civil War, seemed determined to identify and emulate its southern counterparts. 

Additional information about the history of women students, faculty, and staff can be found in the recently published, Our Rightful Place: A History of Women at the University of Kentucky, 1880-1945.

 https://www.kentuckypress.com/9780813179377/our-rightful-place/

 

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