Faculty Manual - COST Home Page - Texas Southern University

Ryan Junior High). In 1947 it moved to a fifty-three acre tract in the southeastern part of the city,
which is the present location of Texas Southern University. To construct the new campus for the
Houston College for Negroes, a citizens’ committee headed by Dr. John W. Davis raised
$100,000, a substantial portion of which was contributed by Thornton M. Fairchild and by Mr.
and Mrs. C. A. Dupree. Hugh Roy Cullen and friends (including the Anderson Foundation)
donated an additional $100,000, and in April 1947, the Thornton M. Fairchild Memorial Building
was dedicated as the first building on the new campus.
In the summer of 1947, the State purchased this campus as the site for the institution that the
Legislature had established the previous spring. In September 1947, the Texas State University
for Negroes opened with an enrollment of 2,303 students.
In 1951 the name of the institution was officially changed to Texas Southern University.
Initially, the University consisted of the College of Arts and Sciences, the Graduate School, the
School of Law, and the School of Vocational and Industrial Education. The School of Pharmacy
was added in 1949. Also in 1971, the School of Vocational and Industrial Education became the
School of Technology.
During its first year of operation the University was under temporary administration. Allen E.
Norton, on leave from the Houston Independent School District, served as Acting President for
the first semester, while William H. Bell, Registrar-Director of Admissions and Acting Dean,
chaired an administrative committee which was responsible for University operations during the
semester. During this period construction began on Hannah Hall, the $2,000,000 administration
classroom building.
On July 2, 1948, R. O’Hara Lanier, former United States Minister to Liberia, became the first
President of the University and served in this capacity until the summer of 1955. Following Dr.
Lanier’s resignation, the Texas Southern University Board of Directors selected Samuel M.
Nabrit, Dean of the Graduate School at Atlanta University, as the second President of the
University. Dr. Nabrit took office in September 1955, and was chief executive until he resigned
to become a member of the Atomic Energy Commission in July 1966. Joseph A. Pierce, Dean of
the Graduate School and Director of the Summer Session, served as Acting President until his
retirement in the summer of 1967. During the 1967-68 year, the administrative affairs of the
University were handled by an interim executive committee consisting of H. Hadley Hartshorn,
Dean of the College of Arts and Sciences; A. L. Palmer, Vice President for Fiscal Affairs; and
Everett O. Bell, Assistant to the President and Director of Instructional Personnel.
Granville M. Sawyer, Assistant to the President of Tennessee State University, served from July,
1968 to September, 1979, as the fourth President of Texas Southern University. Following Dr.
Sawyer’s resignation, Everett O. Bell, Vice President for Personnel Services, assumed the
position of Interim President and served in that capacity until August 1980. In recognition of his
service, the Texas Southern Board of Regents retroactively named him the fifth President of the
University. On August 1, 1980, Leonard H. O. Spearman, Associate Deputy Assistant Secretary
for Higher and Continuing Education in Washington, D.C. became the sixth President of the
University. On June 18, 1986, Dr. Robert J. Terry, distinguished Professor of Biology and
formerly the Vice President for Academic Affairs, was appointed Interim President following the
resignation of Dr. Spearman.
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