and my older brother’ s Godfather. In my mind, Historically Black Colleges and Universities( HBCU) were a part of my family tree.
So, not surprisingly, Spike Lee’ s movie, coupled with my family’ s HBCU connection, led me to be both excited and apprehensive about this next chapter in my young life.
The combination of my good grades, SAT score and student leadership activities caused the director of Morgan State University’ s Honors Program to call my home after I got an acceptance letter from the Baltimore school. When my mother answered, the guy on the other end of the line was Dr. Clayton Stansbury, Jr., who was at the halfway point of his 16 years in that job.
Stansbury told my mom that Morgan was offering me a full academic scholarship. nation. He said we were all capable of greatness beyond our imagination. That meeting was transformational for me.
Imagine that. Here was a Black man with PhD telling me that my life had value – that I had value. Just a few months earlier, my high school guidance counselor had cautioned that I was not“ college material.” He declined to support my college applications because he did not want to“ set me up to fail.”
And now Stansbury was telling me that he not only believed in my ability to succeed at Morgan, but he was investing in me financially, as well. At 18, I had no idea that the door he opened would put me in the company of some of the legends of Morgan, a school whose history is full of remarkable people.
One of them was Dr. Earl S. Richardson. He was just beginning his fourth year as Morgan’ s 9th inaugurated president when I arrived at the Northeast Baltimore school in 1988. Over his 26 years at Morgan’ s helm, he would distinguish himself in a myriad of ways. But many people believe his crowning achievement was not his leadership at Morgan, but instead his behind-the-scenes role as the visionary of the 2006 lawsuit that brought to light Maryland’ s disparate treatment of its four HBCUs.
In 2021, a settlement of $ 577 million was reached in the 15 years long legal tussle.
In 1988, there were many other icons on Morgan’ s campus.
Photos Courtesy Edwin T. Johnson
In the summer of 1988, I attended a weeklong freshmen orientation at Morgan. I lived in O’ Connell Hall.“ OC,” like most of the dorms at Morgan back then, had no“ A. C.” I did not have one good night of sleep that week because of the heat and humidity of that Baltimore summer.
My orientation group included all the freshmen honor students. When we met Dr. Stansbury, he told us that we were special. He said that he had handpicked the best and brightest students from high schools across the
Johnson’ s parents on their wedding day( Eugene & Lorraine Johnson)
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