Mr. G. C. Wilkinson, the present principal of this school, was educated in the public schools of the District of Columbia, finishing the course at the M Street High School in June, 1898. He was graduated from Oberlin, with the degree of A.B. in 1902, and from the Law Department of Howard University in 1909. In 1902 he was appointed teacher in the M Street High School and discharged his duties in the new field of action with enthusiasm and zeal. During these years Mr. Wilkinson devoted much of his time after school hours to the training and instructing of athletic teams, particularly football and baseball, at a time when physical training for high school boys was not an established part of the regular curriculum. This interest was not confined to M Street High School only but extended to all secondary schools of the vicinity and resulted in the formation of the Inter-Scholastic Athletic Association of the Middle Atlantic States under whose auspices track meets and basket ball were first introduced into the capital of the nation. Thus athletic interest was extended, until they were registered in the Amateur Athletic Union of America as the first and at present the only football officials of color in America. Mr. Wilkinson was equally active in assisting the military organization of the high school. In November, 1912, Mr. Wilkinson was promoted to the principalship of the Armstrong Manual Training School and transferred to the principalship of the Dunbar High School, July 15, 1916.
It is safe to assert that at the head of no school in the United States have there been teachers who have availed themselves of better educational advantages than have the principals of the high school for the education of Negroes in the District of Columbia. In looking over the list one observes that of the ten principals, who have guided and molded the school, two held degrees from Harvard University, three from Oberlin College, one from Dartmouth, one from Amherst, one from Western Reserve University, and one was educated in the University of Glasgow in Scotland.
But, however well-trained and strong the principal of a school may be, it is impossible for him to accomplish as much as he might, if his teachers also are not efficient and conscientious in the discharge of their duties. In this respect this high school has been greatly blessed, for the teachers have, as a rule, not only enjoyed superior educational advantages, but have faithfully discharged their duties. Although it is impossible in this article to mention by name all the teachers who have done so much to raise the standard of the high school to the enviable position it occupies to-day, no sketch, however short, could do the subject justice without reference to a few of the instructors who have been in the school almost from its establishment to the present time. Among these none have rendered more valuable service than the late Miss Laura Barney, for many years a teacher of history and an assistant principal, Miss Carolina E. Parke, teacher of algebra, Miss Harriet Riggs, head of the English Department, Mr. Hugh M. Browne, instructor in physics, and Mr. T. W. Hunster, the organizer and director of the Drawing Department.
It would be difficult to name a high school, the graduates or former pupils of which have achieved success in such numbers and of such brilliancy as have those trained in the high school for Negroes in the District of Columbia. If one investigates the antecedents of some of the young Negroes who have made the most brilliant records at the best universities in the country, he will discover that a large number of them were trained in this high school. Miss Cora Jackson by competitive examination won a scholarship at the University of Chicago. Phi Beta Kappa keys have been won by R. C. Bruce at Harvard, Ellis Rivers at Yale, Clyde McDuffie and Rayford Logan at Williams, Charles Houston and John R. Pinkett at Amherst, Adelaide Cooke at Cornell, and Herman Drear at Bowdoin.
In scanning the list of the men and women whose foundation of education and usefulness was laid in this institution, one is surprised to see the wide range of positions they so creditably fill. In almost every trade and profession open to the colored American, from a janitorship to a judgeship, it is possible to find a man or a woman who has either completed or only partially completed the course of this high school. Mr. R. C. Bruce, a graduate of Harvard College, now assistant superintendent of colored public schools; Miss Nannie Burroughs, the founder and president of the National Training School for Women; Mr. Frederick Morton, principal of the Manassas Industrial School; Miss Marian Shadd, Mr. John C. Nalle, Major James E. Walker, supervising principals in the District of Columbia; Dr. John Smith, the statistician of the Board of Education; Miss Emma G. Merritt, director of primary instruction; Mr. Charles M. Thomas, a successful instructor in the Miner Normal School; 36 out of the 47 principals of buildings and a large corps of efficient teachers of Washington, have all either been graduated from or pursued courses in this high school.
The first Negro who ever won the distinction of being commencement orator at Harvard College was Robert H. Terrell, who studied in the Preparatory High School shortly after it was established and who is now one of five justices in the Municipal Court of the District of Columbia, having been first appointed by President Roosevelt and then reappointed by Presidents Taft and Wilson. The first Negro who was ever elected class orator at Harvard University was Clement G. Morgan, another graduate of this high school. He was formerly a member of the Board of Aldermen in Cambridge, Massachusetts, and is at present a lawyer of good repute.
The young man who won the Pasteur prize at Harvard University, who was twice chosen one of the three to represent Harvard in her debate, first with Princeton and then with Yale, the young man, who, in addition to all this honor, was finally elected class orator, was Roscoe Conklin Bruce, a former student of the same high school. A distinguished representative in the legal profession is Hugh C. Francis, who completed the four-year course in Harvard University in three years, then was graduated from the Harvard Law School with honor and is now practicing his profession in Porto Rico. Other representatives of the law are Albertus Brown, who served as a judge in Toledo, Ohio, for two days by appointment of the mayor, and Ferdinand Morton, Assistant District Attorney of New York City.
The record made by some of the high school graduates in the Army and Navy of this country has been very creditable indeed. When Dewey electrified the world on an eventful day in May some years ago, one of the seamen who aimed a gun straight and made it bark loud was a certain colored youth named John Jordan, who had studied in this same high school. It is even said by those in a position to know that he opened the battle of Manila. It is certain, however, that he was placed in charge of a crew of gunners in a forward turret, and that he was afterward promoted to the position of chief gunner's mate. For a time he was in Annapolis instructing classes in ordnance, the members of which were, of course, practically all white. Just a short time ago he was retired. Frank Stewart, another graduate of this school, served with distinction as a captain of the volunteer army during the Philippine campaign and was later made presidente of a town where he rendered further services with credit to himself and his country.
A few years ago Joseph Cook, another representative of this high school, taught classes in electricity in the training station at Newport. Cook ran a dynamo, an extremely complicated affair, on Admiral Sampson's ship during the Spanish-American war. For some reason he was assigned to other duty on the ship, was taken from the dynamo and a white man was put in his place. But the latter was unable to master the intricacies of the machine and was soon given other work to do.
Oliver Davis is another alumnus of this school. He is now a captain in the United States Army, being the first colored man from the ranks who passed an examination for a commission in the army. Three of the finest lieutenants in the Spanish-American War, Thomas Clarke, Harry Burgess and William Cardozo, were all trained at this institution. Under command of Major James E. Walker, another product of this school, the First Separate Battalion was the first organization to leave the District of Columbia for the Mexican border last summer, because this, the only colored unit in the District National Guard, was the first to be ready for such military service. Eleven of its officers are graduates of this high school. This battalion had the distinction of being generally lauded for the valuable services it rendered the country during the late unpleasantness with Mexico.[358]