Chief Executives of North Carolina A&T

Elected on May 25, 1892, John Oliver Crosby was the first president of what was then known as the Agricultural and Mechanical College for the Colored Race. Born enslaved in South Carolina, he enrolled after the Civil War in Biddle University and later Shaw University, where he earned a degree in theology in 1874. He became an ordained minister, and then principal of the N.C. State Colored Normal School, a college for training teachers.

In Greensboro, Crosby played an important role in building a foundation for the new college, designing the first buildings and creating its first two departments: Agriculture and Mechanical Arts.

A&M's second president, James Benson Dudley, was also born an enslaved person. His parents were enslaved by North Carolina Governor Edward B. Dudley, and young James adopted the governor's belief that "everyone should be educated." Like Crosby, he studied at Shaw and then went on to summer studies at Harvard University. He earned a master's degree from Livingstone College and a law doctorate from Wilberforce University.

The General Assembly named him a trustee for A&M in 1895, and he was elected unanimously to succeed Crosby in 1896. Over an influential, 29-year career, he tailored the college's curriculum to prepare students for available jobs to "raise the standard of living among their people." A&M was renamed the Negro Agricultural and Technical College of North Carolina under his leadership in 1915. He created a department for teacher preparation and helped launch the statewide farmer's institute for Negroes. He died suddenly while still president at the age of 65.

Ferdinand Douglass Bluford was the first person born after the abolition of slavery to lead the college. A graduate of Howard University, he taught at colleges in Kentucky and Virginia before joining A&T as a faculty member, then dean and vice president before being appointed acting president after James Dudley's death.

Bluford's 30-year tenure as president, the longest of any A&T leader, saw the college add schools of Agriculture, Education, Engineering, Nursing and General Studies, as well as the Technical Institute. As a result of his leadership, the N.C. Department of Education reclassified A&T from a D-rated college in 1927 to an A-class campus in 1932. Its enrollment grew from 350 to 3,000 during his tenure. He died four days before Christmas in 1955, like Dudley, while still president.

 Born in Baldwin, Louisiana, Warmoth Thomas Gibbs had a thirst for learning, earning bachelor's degrees in political science, history and general studies before completing his master's degree in Education from Harvard. He also had a penchant for leadership, enlisting in the U.S. Army during World War I and becoming one of its few Black officers. As a second lieutenant, he saw combat in France in 1917-18. 

Gibbs began his career at A&T in 1926 as dean of men and head of the military service unit, the precursor to ROTC. Upon President Bluford's death in 1955, he was named acting president and officially inaugurated as president the following year. Under his leadership, A&T was accredited in 1959 for the first time by the Southern Association of Colleges and Secondary Schools.

The sit-in protest of the A&T Four began Feb. 1, 1960, and Gibbs faced significant pressure from white city leaders to stop it. He refused, famously saying, "We teach our students how to think, not what to think." He stepped down later that year with the protests still underway.    

Samuel DeWitt Proctor was the first leader of A&T to have a major national profile. Born to university-educated parents in Norfolk, Virginia, he earned a bachelor's degree from Virginia Union University in 1942, then went on to graduate studies at the Crozer Theological Seminary in Pennsylvania, where he befriended Martin Luther King Jr. Worshipping at Calvary Baptist, he became known as one of the Sons of Calvary along with King and William Augustus Jones Jr. He graduated from Crozer and then earned a doctorate at the Boston University School of Theology. He became pastor of the Pond Street Church in Rhode Island and a John Price Crozer Fellow at Yale.

After Yale, Proctor began teaching at Virginia Union, and rose quickly to dean, vice president and then president at the age of 33. At King's invitation, he went to Montgomery in 1955 to speak during the bus boycott. He was later invited to the White House by President Dwight Eisenhower.

In 1960, he was named president of the institution now known as the Agricultural and Technical College of North Carolina. He arrived with the sit-ins led by the A&T Four in full swing. Behind the scenes, he raised money and found attorneys for students arrested in the protest. He took a leave of absence from A&T in 1963-64 to serve as associate director of the Peace Corps, first in Washington, D.C., and then in Nigeria.

He went on to serve as president of the National Council of Churches, president of the Institute for Service to Education, the Martin Luther King Distinguished Professor of Education at Rutgers and finally as pastor of the famed Abyssinian Baptist Church in Harlem. In addition to his work in the Kennedy administration, he was an adviser to the President Lyndon B. Johnson administration and a good friend of Justice Thurgood Marshall and Democratic presidential nominee Hubert Humphrey.

 Lewis Carnegie Dowdy was born in Eastover, S.C. and educated in public schools before graduating cum laude from Allen University in Columbia. He went on to earn master's and doctoral degrees in education from Indiana State College and Indiana University Bloomington.

He began his teaching career at A&T in 1951, later becoming dean of the School of Education and General Studies and then dean of Instruction. When President Proctor took a leave of absence to help lead the newly established Peace Corps, Dowdy stepped in as acting president. He was officially inaugurated as A&T's sixth president on April 10, 1964.

The college flourished under his leadership, experiencing unprecedented success in enrollment, academics, research, athletics and capital improvements, such as the Corbett Sports Center and Aggie Stadium. He led the College of Engineering, Schools of Nursing and Business and programs in teacher education, industrial technology, chemistry and social work all to national accreditation. In 1967, A&T was named a regional university, and in 1972, it became a constituent campus of the University of North Carolina System. As it did, Dowdy was re-appointed as its first chancellor, making him the only A&T leader to serve as both president and chancellor of the university.

Having already served for eight years as president of A&T, Lewis Carnegie Dowdy in 1972 began an eight-year tenure as the university’s first chancellor. Chancellor Dowdy’s growth-oriented leadership saw the university added numerous strategic elements, such as a student center, five major academic buildings, a new dining hall and a development office.

Under Dowdy, externally funded research operations grew so significantly that moved A&T into the no. 3 position among North Carolina’s public research universities. Dowdy himself was elected president of the influential National Association of State Universities and Land-grant Colleges, known today as the Association of Public and Land-Grant Universities or APLU. He often conferred with U.S. Presidents on higher education policy and funding issues and testified before numerous congressional committees.

Dowdy stepped down in 1980. Today, A&T’s central administration building bears his name.

Upon Chancellor Dowdy’s retirement, Cleon Franklin Thompson Jr. was named interim chancellor on Nov. 1, 1980. Born in New York, Thompson went on to earn bachelor’s and master’s degrees from North Carolina Central University and a doctorate in education administration from Duke.

He began his career as an A&T faculty member, teaching for one year before going on to serve in various roles at Tuskegee University, Shaw University (which he served as acting president) and the University of North Carolina, playing a critical role in resolving Chapel Hill's desegregation dispute with the federal government.

Following his year as interim A&T chancellor, he was named chancellor of Winston-Salem State University in 1985, becoming the first of two individuals to lead both institutions. After 10 years in that role, he resigned to work in the UNC System. Winston-Salem State’s Cleon F. Thompson Center is named in his honor.

With an expanded university framed out, Edward Bernard Fort was elected chancellor in 1981. Born in Detroit, Fort completed his bachelor’s degree at Wayne State University before going on to earn a doctorate in educational administration from Berkeley. After teaching at both the University of Michigan and Michigan State, he served as superintendent of the Inkster Michigan Public  School System and the Sacramento City Unified School District before being named chancellor of the University of Wisconsin Colleges.

He joined A&T in September, 1981, and aggressively led A&T toward national prominence in engineering and technical education. During his tenure, the university launched more than 30 new degree programs and undertook $80 million in campus construction and renovations.

After an 18-year tenure, he resigned and was named chancellor emeritus, special adviser to the chancellor and a professor of Leadership Studies. The university’s Edward B. Fort Interdisciplinary Research Center is named in his honor.

Born in Rockford, Illinois, James Carmichael Rennick earned bachelor’s, master’s and doctoral degrees from Central State University, the University of Kansas and Florida State University, respectively. He held faculty and administrative roles at the University of South Florida, the University of West Florida and George Mason before being named chancellor of the University of Michigan-Dearborn in 1993.

Rennick was elected to succeed Chancellor Fort at North Carolina A&T in 1999. Under his leadership, A&T set enrollment records and expanded its physical plant. He left the university in 2006 for a vice presidency of the American Council on Education.

Lloyd Vincent "Vic" Hackley was appointed interim chancellor of North Carolina in June 2006 and served in the role for one year. A native of Roanoke, Virginia, Hackley earned an undergraduate degree in political science from Michigan State University and a doctorate in international relations from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

He served as U.S. Air Force officer, earning numerous honors, including the Bronze Star for Valor, the Meritorious Service Medal and the Vietnam Cross for Gallantry. He also coached track and cross-country at the U.S. Air Force Academy. He later served in numerous positions for in North Carolina and Arkansas, including as president of the North Carolina Community College System, chancellor of Fayetteville State University, chair of the Arkansas Civil Rights Commission and as a vice president of the UNC System. He also chaired the President’s Advisory Board on Historically Black Colleges and Universities.

Born in Springfield, Massachusetts, Stanley Fred Battle earned a bachelor's degree from Springfield College, a master's from the University of Connecticut and a master's and doctorate from the University of Pittsburgh. 

He held faculty and administrative roles at the University of Minnesota, Boston University, the University of Connecticut, Eastern Connecticut State and the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee before being appointed president of Coppin State College in Maryland in 2003.

Four years later, he was elected chancellor of North Carolina A&T. Over two years, Battle led A&T to become the first historically Black college or university (HBCU) to receive a prestigious Engineering Research Center grant from the National Science Foundation and the first HBCU to open a Wall Street trading room in its College of Business and Economics.

He also implemented the Lewis C. Dowdy Scholars program, a prestigious four-year, full-ride scholarship for top students; the program today continues to draw top scholars from across the country.

Harold L. Martin Sr. was named chancellor of North Carolina A&T in May 2009, becoming the first alumnus of A&T to lead the university. His 15-year tenure was the culmination of a 43-year relationship with A&T as a student, faculty member, department chair, dean and vice chancellor for academic affairs.

Born in Winston-Salem, Martin graduated from public schools before enrolling in North Carolina A&T in 1969. He earned his bachelor's and master's degree in electrical engineering at A&T before completing his Ph.D. at Virginia Tech. He returned to A&T in 1980, and rose steadily through the ranks before being named vice chancellor in 1994. Martin was elected chancellor of Winston-Salem State University in 2000, and named executive vice president of the UNC System for academic affairs in 2006.

Following his 2009 election as A&T chancellor, Martin led A&T on a march toward national preeminence with an aggressive strategic plan and a new commitment to academic excellence. By 2014, A&T had become America's largest historically Black university. The strong academic standards attracted a flood of students, making A&T one of the nation's fastest growing doctoral research universities in applications. By the end of his tenure, A&T had grown enrollment to nearly 14,000, research funding to more than $100 million, endowment to more than $200 million (largest among public HBCUs) and economic impact to $2.4 billion a year.

Upon his retirement, he was named chancellor emeritus of A&T. At the request of the system president, he serves as a special adviser to new chancellors within the UNC System.